I've been told that "waiting well is preparing well." I assume the only semblance of truth that can be derived from this is if we assume that the "waiting" was laden with preparation.

I find this notion to be incredibly disconcerting considering that many times when we are waiting, we are waiting precisely to see what is coming next.

How in the hell are we supposed to prepare for a test where the material could range anywhere from the mitochondria and cell wall functioning to the rhetorical appeal of Atticus Finch?

Heaven forbid the test is on what it's like to find yourself enveloped by the quicksand of sorrow to which I would immediately start looking for extra credit opportunities.

In my experience, "waiting well is preparing well" when I can envision how I want to feel when I get to wherever it is that I'm waiting to go, even if I don't know what the path or result itself looks like.

I'm fond of a quote that says: "Dwelling from, not upon, the space you want to inherit is the fastest way to change absolutely everything."

I have a complicated relationship with change primarily because of my entanglement with the restrictive limbs of control. I have often found resemblance between the way control feels with the iconic vision of an aged, decrepit, haunted house only held together by the tangle of weeds and overgrown trees that cling to the exterior like static clings unforgivingly to the silk slip that grazes the upper portion of a woman's leg: hindering each step, each opportunity for freedom or a long-awaited release.

That is what a hampering relationship with control feels like, haunted houses and a need for static guard.

But oh how I wish it were this simple. Control is an antonym to patience in my dictionary defined by life.

A lack of control in my life at large makes me feel suffocatingly impatient.

Control is the driving force behind my anxiety and the perfectly matched set of black hangers that hold the color-coded clothes that I choose from in the early morning hush at 6 a.m.

Control is the defensive team when I'm running blindly on the offensive towards my goal.

Control is the linebacker that comes out of nowhere and reminds me that I had no business being on the field in the first place because like a fish unprotected in the vast expanse of the water, there's an entire sea of vulnerability that surrounds me and that I have no control over.

Now I find myself underwater, and the sense of suffocation makes me yearn for a snorkel or someway to connect me back to my air, my life source, my control.

I don't wait well, but I am one hell of a preparer.

This is why waiting in uncertainty only lends me the eyes to see one thing: I begin to see that I certainly don't like uncertainty.

When we feel prepared, it means that we know what to expect. I will continue to question the relationship between waiting and preparing but perhaps what is most interesting about the dynamic between the two, is the hindsight. For it is only when we look back, in hindsight, that we can understand that all of our waiting, was, in fact, perfect preparation for wherever we currently are that allows us to feel safe, secure, and look back at our trail of breadcrumbs to see how we arrived the way we did.