Throughout my life, uncertainty has remained an old, bitter friend, ageless, faceless, and invisible.

Uncertainty is there when I wake up. It's my alarm clock, washrag, body soap, towel. It's there when I eat breakfast. The bubbles in my chocolate milk, the syrup I pour on my pancakes, the crisp of my bacon. It's even there while I'm in class, often colliding with my plans to focus for the next 90 minutes. It's there and not there at the same time, having a large impact while having such little growth and substance to it. In shorter words, it is a threat, a threat to my safety and a threat to my security. As someone who loves to plan ahead, uncertainties can cause major setbacks.

To me, planning is a great art; the planner is like a painter with his tools, or a janitor with his mop. Sometimes, I think deeply about the future for my own good, yet against my will. My daydreams remain activities of passive passion, and they never manifest into much more than passing thoughts and ideas dispersed throughout the day. And this can be a problem for someone who enjoys taking control of his life, writing down and planning every detail, taking note of budding interests and how to expand on them, and the like.

In the past month, I've undergone some major decision-making in terms of my standing at Haverford and where to go for next semester. During this time I've shifted in ideas for a major, activities to participate in, and courses to take. I've done "adult" things like sending payments I owe and working in the college bookstore. Then over time, I saw many of these elements either fall into place or tear down completely. The classes that I want have bad timing with other classes, or certain things change. I've realized that I have to pay taxes despite getting financial aid, which puts a strain on paying off student loans as soon as possible. Sometimes, it gets difficult to balance everything at once, in addition to the coursework I am required to do. I've even considered transferring for a brief stint of time. People tend to say that the only constant thing is change itself, but how much of it is really necessary? When life just says you've had enough? I acknowledge how much I've changed over the semester, but part of me still feels as though there's more work needs to be done.

When you're in a institution trying to find the best of yourself, you find that there's not much you can really do about the things that actually matter. Whether it'll be different after college, I have no idea, because the routes become even more disorganized and spread thin. Much of it is beyond my control and even seems set in place before I arrive. I guess I'm still learning to adapt to this truth bit by bit. I'll probably always be learning it.