I have a lot of plans, people. Big plans, little plans. You name it. I got it.

Here I have kindly compiled for you A Completely Random Selection of Some of My Plans in No Particular Order:

(Lucky. Lucky. You.)

1. Write stuff. Doesn’t have to be good stuff. Just some stuff on a page.

2. Scratch that last part. Write BEST STUFF EVER.

3. Live a humble existence.

4. HAHAHAHA, NO. Be incredibly famous.

5. Learn to play a drum. Notice that I did not say ‘drums.’ Just one is fine. I’m only human, people.

6. Play my drum somewhere where other people can see and hear me playing it. This does not sound scary to you but that is because you are a normal person who does not begin to sweat from every single pore of your body whenever more than one person’s attention is directed at you. Evidence of my fear of the public: I have been writing this blog for two full months and have literally given NO ONE the url as of this post.

7. Maybe I’m adding overcome self-consciousness to my list of plans right now because #6 made me self-conscious about how self-conscious I am.

8.  😥

Ok, enough of this. It’s turning into a tail-spin. #8 wasn’t even a plan, it was just an emoticon.

If you’re wanting me to explain the point of all this, you’re about to be very disappointed.

The other day at work I was in a meeting and was having a bit of trouble catching my breath. You know, just your average ‘we’re talking about site stats, no time for breathing’ sort of thing. My coworker asked me if I was okay and I said ‘gaspyesIthinksogasp’ (dramatization) and then he casually asked me if I was having a panic attack while flipping through his meeting notes.

Not like, OMG Are You Having A Panic Attack?

Just an offhanded nice weather we’re having, can I get you a paper bag to breathe into?

It was surreal. Because, partly, I was like YES I THINK I AM. But I said, no it’s probably just asthma. Not really sure I have asthma but it sounds convincing and work appropriate. I’ll take an inhaler over a paper bag in a meeting any day.

About 3 weeks ago I was 100% convinced that I had congestive heart failure. Because, hello, I can’t breathe well sometimes for days at a time. My doctor very kindly pretended to consider that this was a possibility and not merely the mental wanderings of a deranged hypochondriac,and gave me a very sweet speech about how that is 100% impossible but hey, great thought coughwhere’dyoupickthatupWebMD?cough.

Not a great thought though, actually, because it turns out that thinking you have congestive heart failure? Makes it kind of hard to breathe.

Because maybe it gets you a little anxious.

Because maybe you sometimes get a little panicky about things.

Because maybe you’re just like everyone else with the anxiety problem they can’t wait to talk about.

Except it’s not like it sounds. It’s not like I’m sitting here stressing about things and I’m so sensitive and then, boom, anxiety. Small things that don’t even matter to me very much will cause me to break into a sweat all over my body and I’ll flash so hot I can’t stand to wear clothes. But I do, because what gives me more anxiety than seeing my own pale legs?

It’s almost like an allergy. My body has been responding to regular life as if it’s earth-shattering catastrophe, kind of the same way my respiratory system responds to a cat hair as if it is an injection of Plague.

I am talking about it here just because it’s been a difficult thing for me lately, made more difficult by the fact that I hate tossing around the word anxiety the way people do, like it’s a beach ball. It’s not a beach ball, it’s an anvil. And when it hits your chest you feel like you might never be able to breathe again.

I just read through some things I wrote in college and I kind of liked them. And I kind of like the person who wrote them.

I mean, I realize that person was me but she feels very different from the me I know now. She seems more confident that people will find her thoughts interesting. Or maybe it’s just that she finds her own thoughts pretty interesting. She’s a little more artless, a little more naive and yet a little more reflective.

She seems younger. And that makes sense because, well, she was. And she seems like she had more time to think. Or gave herself more time to think. Or thought more.

And questioned herself less.

I can tell that the me who wrote those things was in the midst of a lot of learning. She was learning who she is, defining herself and the world around her. She was absorbing so much, with heart and eyes wide open.

I hope that I am a person my former self would like to know if she read the things I have written, but I’m not feeling so sure about that.

And something tells me that means it’s time for a change.

Having the dishwasher and the dryer going at the same time makes me feel like an incredibly competent, get-things-done sort of person.

I’m drying clothes, washing dishes, and typing a blog post. Right now. Be amazed.

On the other hand, I just had yet another birthday  and still have not written a novel. Or a short story. Or  thank you cards for last year’s Christmas gifts.

I had a motto for a while. It was ‘Great by 28!!!’ With three exclamation points because YAY I believe in me!!!

So did I make it? I don’t know.

I mean I’m drying clothes and washing dishes at the same time today so I feel like, yeah. Maybe I made it.