I do know a few things.

I do know I would rather wear my red flannel shirt than any piece of clothing I have ever owned.

I know my nose is crooked because I was just as bad at dodging softballs when I was 14 as I am now.

I know that my maté gourd is named Tika, after a black and tan hound puppy that I loved more than any dog I’ve ever met.

  

 

I know maté, a good friend, and a guitar is a hard combination to trump.

 

So if someone asks me why my checkered shirt is missing buttons, or why I talk to my yerba maté, or why my nose looks lopsided, I can tell them.

But no one asks me those kinds of questions.

Instead people look past my nose, into my eyes, and the most-frequently-asked-question comes in a tone that says they are really interested.

“So Esta, what are you planning to do after graduation?”

Leans forward. Expectant look.

Blast. Blast. Blast.

And I look them in the eye, like I only can when I’m being real  and I say,

 “I don’t know”

I have a thousand ideas, but a thousand is sometimes worse than two because it’s hard to find Waldo, that is, the one to be found, in a crowd of a thousand.

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 “ ..and we are like visionaries who know every road in town but cannot find their way home…”

 – Jean-Pierre De Caussade

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I guess I could just tack up all the ideas and then play Pin the Life on the Plan

Except that would  be pulling back the control again and, goodness knows, if that lesson hasn’t resonated in my thick skull by now, I should be the one that sits on the thumb tack.

I don’t know 

Plus, I’ve throw out the idea of pretending, like the old apple core under my bed.

Please tell me it’s much jollier, you know, to be a Pippin, and toss ones curls at the unknown and the somber assembly of heroes  and chirp,

“Where ar’we going?”