Close your eyes. Picture what you love the most. Picture the perfect day, the perfect holiday, the perfect moment.
No lines, no waiting, no arguments, all assumptions accurate, no unforseen hang ups. Expectation whispers in our dreams of true and perfect love. Someone who devotes themselves to us and heals us while we meet their expectations effortlessly to beautiful theme music and birdsong. Not tires or garbage strewn through nature like cheap trashy clothes.
Reality, we are imperfect. We bear scars and wounds, opinions and assumptions which can be hard to bear let alone unleash in a partner's life. Some days I wake up with expectations for the day only to have a migraine shred them, weather suddenly decide that flooding had to happen on a day when hiking plans were in place.
Holidays really have a way of brining out the worst. Expectation has its hopes dashed. It cuts into our hearts, tears with a vengeance crying for justice. Justice. Just is, would be the apt reply from reason. My dear friend Bruce would smile and say "It just is." I shared conversation with a fellow this evening that was hurt, his family made it clear they patronized his input and tuned him out. He was wonderful. His family was wonderful. Their expectations were injurious to each other. I got them all laughing and you could practically see time and reason working bandages around the injuries left by expectation.
Expectation doesn't care. It doesn't reason. It's like a two year old leaving messes everywhere, loudly demanding, with a need to hear its pain echo.
Sitting on a plane headed to Dallas I am reminded of the vast difference between expectation and reality. I anticapted the potential for horrendous weather in Pittsburgh, Columbus, and especially Detroit this week. Irony: their weather is anticipated to be temperate. Dallas on the other hand is wracked by storms. Last night people died from tornados going through the area.
New Year's will not exist for me. I will be on a plane crossing time zones. It will be something that passes without notice or recognition like a morning jogger with headphones running on a misty forest trail. It's just another moment, part of any day. It feels odd to know that I will not experience a specific second in my life, although hundreds pass by at night while I sleep. I wonder if seconds ever have expectations, if their feelings get hurt because we favor the seconds we spend with those we love.
Two voices edit thoughts and feelings within me. One uses expectations. The other uses logic and observations. I usually think the logical side is colder but during the holidays I realize what a true bastard expectations are, always hiding behind ideals and shining a light to accent the disparity between what is and what we dream of.
It's up to us. Recognize expectations, where they are healthy and harmful. It is up to us to find ways to achieve our dreams. Fly.
Sometime next year I will pick a random second to make special. It will be my New Year's second. I'm going to save it for a special occasion, it may choose it's own moment to shine. It will be more interesting than starting the year with it gone.
It's round one in the match. That's what logic says. Expectation is dreaming up a stage and a story. I'm shaking my head trying to convince these foes that they could work together to create instead of frustrate. One day perhaps they'll come to terms.
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