15. PLANS

My childhood diary is full of training plans.

Training plans for improving my ability to perform real magic. Training plans for teaching my dog to read. Training plans for how to convert to all-fours running full-time (the goal was to become an actual wolf). Training plans for teaching my friend Joey how to draw faster and better. I wrote down the name of every waterslide I’d ever been on. Who knows what my endgame was, but I genuinely suspect it might have been to ride every waterslide in the world.

If someone ever found the plans and had to guess what the person who wrote them was trying to accomplish, their best guess would probably be gladiator training. This person is clearly training themselves to be a gladiator in some aquatic dystopia ruled by wolves.

On August 8th, 1996, I outlined my plan for eliminating the need to sleep under the covers. I don’t know why I felt that was necessary, but, by the end of October 1996, I planned to be free of this disgusting weakness.

If I believe something will work, that is very dangerous.

In July of 1991, for example, I thought I discovered the secret to breathing underwater:

I didn’t give up until September.

It just seemed… possible.

Such is the danger of optimism. If you think you can do it, you’ll try. And you might keep trying. If it works, great—you did it. You don’t need blankets anymore. Good job. That was really hard, which is amazing when you consider how much you didn’t need to do it.

If it doesn’t work, you’ll keep trying anyway.

There’s always the dangling carrot of what you could be if you maxed out.