“Way to be spontaneous, babe,” Ch said.
“I’ve been planning this all week,” I replied, of course. And I had been. I set a reminder. I planted hints. I agonized over the final decision. I leaned toward no.
But when we said yes, the excitement sunk in, and I knew it was the right decision.
I don’t know how to be spontaneous. Not remarkably so, anyway.
My sister would tell me I need to gradually work spontaneity into my life. That’s called exposure therapy. We use its suggestion as a weapon in our house sometimes. A lighthearted weapon.
When she and C suggested that I do exposure therapy for my fear of cockroaches, I panicked. Avoiding them is making my fear worse, they said. You just need to spend a little time warming up to them, they said.
Hell. No.
No way. There is no benefit to me being “more comfortable” with cockroaches. No freaking way. I can’t even handle plastic bugs. Not even colorful, relatively friendly looking ones. You will never catch me doing exposure therapy with cockroaches. EVER.
So my case for recommending exposure therapy to them will be much less effective now. Fine. It’s getting to be a tired theme anyway. That’s what I get for having a psychologist for a sister.
Back to my spontaneity. I am spontaneously writing this right now. So that’s something. And I spontaneously go to the store on a regular basis. I spontaneously went for a walk this morning. I spontaneously ate a chocolate chip cookie. Something tells me none of this is spontaneity. Or maybe I can’t be spontaneous with events. That sounds right.
You can’t just drop a “hey, let’s go to ______ for the weekend” on me. It’s never a good idea. For either of us. Or, “So-and-so is coming over for dinner tonight.” Mmm mmm. Unless it’s my sister, who can cook her own dinner if I need her to, it’s not going to go over well.
So a day in my life is only made up of planned moments that sometimes become jumbled with time and sometimes include a “spontaneous” outing that serves a planned purpose. And then dinner happens, somehow, and then we go to bed and do it all over again. Except lately I have been drinking a deliberate Manhattan almost every night. More like 3/4 of a Manhattan. The lack of its spontaneity is what makes it taste that much better. And cheesecake. It’s all going downhill. Soon I’ll replace my morning coffee with a shot of whatever, and I’ll say it was all according to the plan. Check in on me, will ya?
444 words. That’s enough. I’m tired of this stifling 500-word goal crap.