29. Tiny little clementines and the problem with backstories
And a reminder that we're, well, here already.
From the time I was 4 years old (maybe even before), I’ve attached backstory to every minute moment of my life.
I have an extra-bright memory of a grocery store set (I specifically remember the perfectly glossy miniature plastic clementines that came with it) that I’d sit on the floor in my room and play with for hours.
I’d make stories up about the people who would come into the grocery store each day, and I’d give them elaborate backstories and descriptions as I moved my finger along the conveyor belt to make the groceries go by. I dreamed up stories about superstars, about moms and dads, about the town my little grocery store was in — no detail was too small for a story to be attached to it.
As a little girl, I loved the idea of thinking of all the different “perfect” lives I could imagine for someone else to live — and I’d have the time of my life picturing every possible thing that could have happened in someone else’s day.
It was probably that, one day, I pictured that one of those little “lives” would be mine.
And, the older I get and the more life I live, the more often than not it is that the backstory I *used* to picture coming true hasn’t.
I can only imagine the scenarios I’ve pictured myself in and written myself a backstory for over the years.
A few random examples: I spent a whole lot of time from ages 9-11 thinking I’d be a competitive gymnast, and I’d spend hours in the backyard turning cartwheels and imagining myself at the Olympics.
(Narrator: She did not go to the Olympics, nor would she have ever. She hated actually going to gymnastics lessons.)
Late last year I found an apartment complex I liked and proceeded to drive past it any chance I got and then dream about living in it for months.
(By the time I started to actually look at apartments for real, this one wasn’t even on my radar anymore.)
Those are silly examples, but you get it.
I’ve caught onto things, over and over again, in my life — and I’ve driven myself a little crazy trying to commit to them. I’ve built up backstories and ways I wish things would happen again and again (and again), and convinced myself that they were how life was going to go.
(I really hope the rest of you also design backstories for things that haven’t happened to you yet… otherwise you’re going to think I’m insane.)
Here’s the thing, though…. I think my need to craft a backstory and a plan and a dream for every aspect of my life is making me feel, well, behind.
Why? Well, not one of the backstories or plans I’ve created for my life have happened in the way I pictured them… if at all.
(Shocker.)
But, at the same time, guess what?
Not one of the things that have actually happened in my life — the most beautiful, incredible things — are ones that I “planned” for.
So I’m deciding to try and suspend the backstories. To sit in the present. To enjoy the days, and the moments, and the lessons — and to take them as they come.
And I’ll be honest… This is not a fun practice for an impatient, Type A, wants-her-life-planned-out kind of girl. I’d love to imagine backstories for the way my life MIGHT look in 1 or 5 years from now.
I’d love to imagine a first dance at my wedding, or buying the perfect pair of jeans that doesn’t bag out on me throughout the day, or hitting a certain number in my business, or a whole other myriad of things that I hope happen to me one day.
In fact, the thought of not imagining backstories makes me worry even more that those things won’t come true.
But I also want to be present in my life.
I want to enjoy every morning I have left in *this* apartment before my lease is up, and I want to ignore the fact that there might be a homeless guy sleeping in the staircase… but instead look at the way the sun rises perfectly outside my window.
I want to soak in every moment I have running down Greenville Avenue, mascara running down my face, soaked to the bone from a thunderstorm on St. Patrick’s Day.
I want to close my eyes and breathe in every conversation I have with my friends. Every talk I have with my mom. Every late morning I have snuggling with my dog.
I don’t want to be a person who thinks that life will start when X happens, or life will be real when Y happens — because that’s silly, and life is worth a lot more than that to me.
Life is now, you know?
It’s here, already, and I think a lot of us forget about that. I sure as hell know I do.
We want to think it’s going to be here once the next thing we’ve been daydreaming about and waiting for is here.
We want to think that life is going to start with the next raise, or positive pregnancy test, or mortgage signature, or after we lose that next 10 pounds, or after he asks you to marry him, or after we figure out that one thing.
But life is here now. It’s here in the mundane little pieces of our day — just picture those intricate stories I gave my grocery store attendees when I was 5 — and it’s here in every happy hour, every song on the radio, every plane ride, every voice note, every new show we start on Netflix.
We do ourselves a disservice when we ignore the NOW and picture the later, and I think we owe ourselves so much more than that.
So, I’m here to suspend the backstories a little — and lean into the current ones instead.
Join me if you need to, too.