"Man plans and God laughs" is currently, my favorite Yiddish proverb. My second favorite Yiddish proverb is "If Grandma had wheels she would be a wagon." (I just ran into that one searching for the origin of "Man Plans and God laughs") The reason that this is on my mind is that I'm trying to make a plan for 2021. But, honestly, I'm flinching like a hand shy dog over the whole thing. Every time I sit down to give it some thought, I wince and shy away, expecting the next cruel blow of fate. I had such a great plan for 2020. Honestly. Going into 2020, I had my act together as much as I ever had. Business-wise the year was going to be tremendous. It felt like it was all just laid out in front of me, for the taking. And then... and then... Man plans, and God Laughs It all got 2020'd. And in some ways, this was a very good thing. For one thing, it lit a fire under me with my writing again. You see, I had been putting off my own writing so that I could be available for and provide for my family. You almost can't overestimate the amount of time and effort young children take, especially in the first three years of life. From what I understand of both the research and my experience with actual people, those years are the crux. After that, you've got what you've got. But proper nutrition, safety, love, physical affection, structure, and discipline in those early years are very important. And all of this can be collapsed into the single phrase, spend attentive time with your children. As a family we've made sacrifices to make that happen. Most of me not writing and not podcasting, was, part of the plane. And I think that's the correct thing to do. I mean, unless something very unusual happens, my greatest creative works, in terms of impact and longevity, are going to be my kids. If I screw them up (more than the amount required to make them funny) then that mistake is going to compound, possibly across generations. But when everything shut down, I got mad. I felt like I had made a spurned sacrifice -- or at least a mistake. I felt, like I think everyone felt, that I wasn't in control. This too is a gift of 2020. I got snapped around to how little input I had in the course of events. And that's a gift when it makes you focus more intently on the things you can control. The way I look at it like this, when you concern yourself with things you can't do anything about, your power, your ability to affect change in the world, shrinks. Think about that friend you know who is unreasonably obsessed with national politics. Wild emotional swings. Destroying friendships and straining family reunions. And their ability to change the course of politics is infinitesimal, if not non-existent. Yet they get so worked up, that they neglect to do the things they should or could do to make their situation and the situation of those they love better. You know someone like this I'm sure. They rage and their life falls apart more and more, while their attention is devoted to things like correcting someone who is wrong on the internet. But, when you focus on the things you can do, your ability to create change in the world grows. This effect can seem eerie, but honestly, it's one of the truest things I know. So what can I control? My output. Writing is a matter of time and will. So I tore into How to Succeed in Evil once again. In some ways, this is a stupid thing to do. Satire is a very difficult genre to crack. But I had the series outlined. So I followed the outline and threw my hands at the keyboard. In frustration and fear, I wrote. I'm really sketchy on psychotherapy. I think it's a load of horseshit, and the true benefits that someone gets from therapy are accountability and simply having someone to talk to. I don't doubt that depth psychology -- the idea that there is more going on in us than we know -- is correct. But I'm not c