Mark Zientek

Time

Everyone in this world thinks about the future every once in awhile, some more than others, but we all do. It is debatable whether this is a bad thing or not. Thinking ahead certainly has its pros, especially in the business world. From large corporations to small businesses, they are all thinking about how they can make more money in the future, either long term or short term, investing money into the new product that will immensely change the world and make it more efficient. Children arrive at school and as soon as they get there, they are planning what they are doing after school, or they are looking forward to lunch, or even next year in schoolrarely paying attention to what the teacher is saying while they daydream of their fantasies that may never happen, but which are more interesting than whats going on in present reality. As a species we are always looking, planning, or dreaming for the future. Does this ever stop?

I cannot speak for everyone, but my answer is yes it does stop. When people are not thinking of the future they are thinking of the past. This has been one of my deeper years of thinking, I dont know if it has to do with my age or my last year of high school or the events of this year, but I have just been constantly thinking more and more about my future and my past, giving little time to think and focus about the tedious daily events that I auto cruise through without realizing some days. What is so unappealing about the present? Is it the fact that it is so real we cannot handle it, or is it really that dull? We all get into a routine, no matter how old we are, and I think that is the problem with the present. The present is too predictable for the human mind. We human beings usually want something more than we have. My present routine right now is to wake up at 7:15 am, shower, make a cup of coffee, turn my music on, get dressed, sit in my bed up until 7:48, then brush my teeth, walk to school, after school work out until 5:30, eat dinner, go to my dorm and shower, then hang out until check in at 8 pm, homework for at least two hours, and go to sleep around 10:30 to 12, then do it all over again. Routines get old no matter what they are. The day goes by pretty quickly, it is not that it is unbearable, but its the same day in and day out. I know what my school week is like from Monday to Friday the whole school year. It is because of this I long for the future. The future is supposed to be unpredictable. All of your dreams can be obtained and come true. Anything is possible if you put in the work or know the right people. Your life will be more fun and exciting. You will get to travel to Paris and get your dream kiss on the Eiffel Tower, witness the sunrise over the Pyramids of Giza, go to the Land Down Under and see your favorite animal, the

platypus, in the wild, tour Europe, have a mansion in the Caribbean, and be married to a supermodel. I am a realist and as much as I want to believe my dreams, I have a hard time. Yes, there is a chance this can all happen in my lifetime, yes I want it to, but so do another 6 billion people in the world, and there is only so much money in circulation for us all to get our dream future. I am not saying money equates to happiness, but when thinking of the future you never want limits. So I am assuming you are going to need money to be able to do whatever your heart desires. I always say I am ready for the real world to start, but that is a stupid saying. The minute we get spanked in the ass by the doctor, after our mother gives birth to us, the real world starts. The real world is what we see and touch every day, which is the present. The daily stresses, smiles, laughs, and cries are what make it so real to us. There is nothing fake about this world. You only have one life to live. You can mentally separate it into parts like so many of us do, from our schooling ages, until we are on our own working in corporate America, to retirement, all the way until our names are inscribed into our gray tombstone. The problem I have is I keep saying I am ready for the real world, but that is because I am not satisfied with the world I live in. How can I be? Look around. Our world is full of evil, planes being used as weapons of mass destruction to kill innocent people, wars over natural resources, people just killing people for fun, rapists, child molesters, tons and tons of poverty, teenagers becoming drug and sex addicts, what happened to purity? I am not saying there is no beauty in the world, there are a lot of beautiful places and people, but it is covered with the smog of chaos, which I personally never see

going away. Maybe the present is too thrilling for me to live in; I cannot handle the stigma of death lurking behind my shadows, or the emotions involved with the good and evil. I look to the future because I want to be content and happy with life, but will I ever be? My prediction is no, but luckily I am young enough that I can prove myself wrong, but my current stance is I will keep looking to the future until I die, then what? Nothing, I wasted my life looking ahead. Ever since I was little, I looked for the next step in my life to bring me something, maybe a sense of belonging, accomplishment, wholeness, love or happiness. When I was in grade school, I couldnt wait for middle school because it would be so much better, from middle school to high school, from high school to another high school, and now currently from high school to college. My track record thus far says I am not going to find what my soul is looking for in college. Will this end; does this looking ahead ever end? I am not a dreamer, so when I look ahead I see a realistic future ahead of me for my status in life. Its almost the same things as now, but Ill be working as an engineer and living on my own. Maybe it is freedom I am really longing for. It could be that subconsciously I thought by now I would be completely free. Im nineteen years old and my freedom seems to have just been cut off and it is a scary thought. I go to a high school that has enough rules that I feel like Im a toddler again, yet as a whole the community does not trust its students. Less than two months left of this, so I can easily do this, but I have made a scary commitment to college. I am happy with my choice, and I feel like it is the right one, but it is mind blowing that I pretty much just decided on the rest of my life, by saying a simple three letter word. I decided on my school, what I am going to

study, my career, where I fit into a probable income level, and just like that the mysteries of the future are gone. Yes, there will be the small details that make it worthwhile, but the main chunk is decided upon already. The small details include me falling in love and getting married or not falling in love and getting married or being a bachelor for life, having kids or no kids, buying a house, going on numerous vacations, meeting random people that will either impact your life or not, seeing my mother and father and many other loved ones die. Time will only tell what happens exactly, but there are not a lot of possible outcomes, unless some catastrophe happens and changes the course of my life. Which subconsciously is in the back of our minds anyway with things like the world ending December 21, 2012, the rapture, Y2K, Nostradamus, nuclear weapons in the wrongs hands, and natural disasters that we see happening every year. We will all essentially expect the unexpected at one point or another. The odds may be low, but my life can be over at any moment by a plane crashing, a tsunami washing me away, or some stranger shooting me. We have seen everything the mind can come up with from romantic comedies to bloody slasher movies. Anything that can happen has happened, whether it is real or not. If I made up my mind that my future is decided, what exactly separates my past from my future? I cannot physically change either one. The past is written in stone and will be there forever whether you like it or not. You just have to deal with it. Your past is one of your greatest learning tools. Your past makes you who you are. I have learned so much about myself studying my past that it has helped me make decisions that affect my future. So that is the difference between the future and the past, the future can never affect your past,

but the past can shape your future. If one thing happened just slightly differently, I would never be in my dorm room at Masters writing this paper. Where does the present come into my life? It is the bridge that connects my past and future to make it a part of each other. Maybe people are not meant to just live in the present; that is probably why we were given the ability to remember and dream. I think the moment I fully come into touch with myself I can fully come in touch with my surroundings, and then just maybe I can live in the present for a brief moment and enjoy the cruel yet beautiful world around me.