The Fog of Scheduling

Okay, people in family units.

Would someone out there help me understand why scheduling get-togethers with friends winds up being so damn difficult? On the surface, it seems pretty straightforward. People want to get together. Someone picks a time or a range of times, or everyone states their availability. Then one person from the group says let's make it Tuesday at 5:30 or whatever, and people agree or disagree with that. Case closed.

But no. Nooo. Noooooo. The whole thing is apparently draped in an anxious fog of doom.

And now I will release my own vapors. Just because I don't have a lot of personal obligations doesn't mean my time is any less valuable than anyone else's. Still, I, with my fairly empty dance card, do not feel comfortable trying to schedule things with busy people without asking them when they might be free. Apparently, this is the wrong thing to do. It's even more imposing. It was bad enough of me to try to spend time with others. Now I want to know when. So, I seem to wind up selecting the times for many gatherings with people who are much busier that I am. And it has become tiresome.

"Okay, how about 3 a.m. on Monday at the corner of Are You Kidding and Woodland Avenue?"

"Oh, no! That won't work."

"No? What works for you?"

"Oh, I don't know. Whenever."

P.S. This is not intended to represent a conversation that actually took place.

Whenever has a cool, casual ring to it. "Whenever you like." How nice? But whenever is also when things happen that you don't give a shit about. Whenever doesn't really exist.

Communications technology makes scheduling worse. It shouldn't but it does because people think they can keep shifting things around and it also makes it seem better to not schedule things until the last minute.