Future Plans

You've heard the one about life being what happens when you make other plans. That's a frightening proposition for anyone who has a Great Plan For Their Future like we do right now.

It's especially hard for me. Whether it's that I grew up Lutheran (you're not really allowed to want anything if you're Lutheran -- it's about as far from the "Gospel of Prosperity" as you can be) or the fact I read too many Greek tragedies in high school, the thought of making big plans puts me at unease. Maybe that's part of the reason why I've bailed from most of the career paths I've started. It could be simply a desire for novelty (that's a big part of it, I'm sure) but I think it's also because after you've spent a few years in a field you find yourself having to go to the next level. Success in the first few years usually means more success later on, and you need to be ready for it. But I've been broke so long, am I really ready to have money? Not only does prosperity seem outside of being a good Lutheran, I'm not sure it fits with who I am as a person. I think it's related somehow to an actual and metaphysical fear of drowning: getting too far out in the deep end, not being able to get out before I'm crushed and suffocated by all the weight around me. Better to stick to the shallows where it's safe.

Having a kid is what started to change my outlook. It's not that I want to give her all the "things" she might want. (She won't get her own car in high school, I can already tell ya, and if there is a car she gets to use on a regular basis it will be a 1985 Dodge Omni. It was good enough for me, gd!) It's just that being at the office for 10 hours at a stretch, not seeing my kid for basically 3/4ths of her waking hours, just started to depress me. So when she turned 3 months I took family leave from my job and never went back. I thought about freelancing again as a writer for magazines, but that can be just as grueling and require just as much time away from family as working for The Man, especially when travel is involved.

So, we created a company that allows us to set our own schedule to a degree. I can help with Stella's morning routine, usually be home for lunch, and be home in time for a late afternoon walk. Working more can wait until 8 when she's in bed. It's not unlike the Kiribati way, for it's rare that a person does not eat at home with family three meals a day. (The only difference is I don't fish or hunt for crabs.) This kind of day is very gratifying, and, really, if we can keep it up and still pay our bills it will be enough success. It will be all the wealth we need to build.

But something has been nagging me all this time. It's the feeling that, for the first time in MY life, at least, I need to consider the possibility of building something bigger and beyond the day to day. If Stella wants to spend a month learning how to mush dogs in Alaska, I want to be able to help her do that. If she wants to attend a sailing camp, or spend time in an ornithology lab in the Amazon, or attend field hockey camp, I think it would be great to be able to make those things happen. Even better: what if her family could join her on some of these adventures ("Aw, Dad, can't you just drop me off at the bus stop and write me letters!!!") What I'm talking about is spending a few months in the Pacific, a part of the world we can teach her about. Spending summers at the beach near Wilmington which so edified my wife's growing up. I don't know where our interests as a family might take us, but it takes money to make those things happen. In addition, I'm curious to see if our company can edify the community by, number one, providing a high number of high-paying jobs, and, two, getting involved in community initiatives (ex. a new senior center, an after-school place for teens - you get the picture). In short, I'm wondering if the Lutheran in me just needs to go be happily miserable waiting for doomsday someplace else, far away from the rest of me.

So, we're going to PLAN a company strategy that imagines the next twenty years. I expect real life will diverge considerably from what we put down on paper. I'm not afraid of that. It's just that for the first time I'm afraid of staying in the shallow waters too long. It's a good feeling to be "getting in deep." The swimming, after all, is so much better there.