Someone asked me recently where i saw myself in 15 years. i responded that a long time ago, i gave up planning that far ahead. Determined, he still pressed the question.

i drew a total blank.

Then, i had to work at figuring out what 15 more years even looks like. Let’s see, i’m 27 now, plus 15……. 5 and 7 is. . 12, carry the 1… that makes it, um, forty. . . . 42? i think that’s right. (Yes, you can laugh at me. Yes, i do tell people up front to never trust my math skills)

Gawsh. Forty-two. Fifteen years.

Hell, i don’t know what i’m going to be doing next year! i do know that i want to finish up at least another year with Enviros here in Calgary, that i do want to eventually go back to school, and that i have to make at least enough money to figure out how to best deal with my rapidly dying car. i want to start selling paintings, i’d like to keep travelling, i’d like to spend another 1-2 years cooking in planting camps, and well, that’s pretty much my list of the things i’m sure of right now. So projected 15 years forward?

i’d like to arrive on the other side of my 30s relatively unscathed, somewhat wiser, better educated, perhaps in love. i’m not sure i still want to be in Calgary, but you know how life twists and turns and ends up keeping you where you say you don’t want to be (so i’m definitely not saying i don’t want to stay here!!). The old v-dub will most likely be gone, home ownership is something i’ll be more than crossing my fingers for, and i’m hoping that i make sound enough financial decisions to avoid a pile of debt while i’m at it all. It’s nice to project a family onto my future, but that’s hard to do, currently missing key players and all.

And that’s all i’ve got. Somewhere between moving to California on a greyhound bus one year, a surprise arrival at TWU, grocery deliveries via helicopter in northern BC, a concrete post-soviet dormitory, and now waking up to prairie sunrises, i lost all sense of wanting to lock down a future in my own planning. i don’t want to grasp at the small tangible things that i foresee – i’d rather open my eyes, hang on for dear life, and embrace the uncertainty of so many crazy possibilities that life tosses me. There’s a rough framework of expectations/goals in place, but i’m leaving it at that. Perhaps this is naive, but then, perhaps this approach hasn’t done too badly for me yet.

What about you? Do you plan? Do you not plan? How do you balance goals and unpredictability?