The Remedy for Our Mortality

Start hearin’ it in high school,
The cacophony of voices:
Where are you going to college?
Whatcha gonna study?
Where you gonna go after that?

You got to have a ten-year plan, ya see,
Typed out in full-on serif font.
Bullet-points ain’t good enough.
Nope—etch in all the details,
Carve out every step,
every thought,
every breath.

And when you clutch that fancy degree,
Clutch it tight in your clammy little hands,
Well, then, of course, you still gotta be ten steps ahead.
Only take a job
That can get you where you wanna go.
Gotta improve,
Gotta advance,
Gotta have ambition, see.

But sometimes I wonder,
With all the plotting and schemes,
When d’you ever get the time
To actually enjoy where you’re at?
Will you ever get there, where you want to be,
Or will there look just like here,
Just one more first step on the journey
To the ambiguous end goal of fame,
Fortune,
Success.

Do those things really exist—
Or are all our plans really just a hopeless remedy
For our inevitable mortality?

---

It’s time for an update on Dressember.  Thus far, this challenge to wear a dress every day during December has raised over $255K for International Justice Mission, a global organization that works to liberate and rehabilitate people in modern-day slavery and helps countries develop functioning justice systems to prevent future abuse.  It’s more than just a dress, it’s a fashion challenge at whose core is dignity and freedom for all people.  If you’d like to read more, visit Dressember’s website or check out my previous post.

If you would like to support International Justice Mission, click on this link: https://support.dressemberfoundation.org/fundraise?fcid=354197