I helped a friend update a church website the other day. It was nice to be asked to help out, and nicer still to be asked to help in a matter where I actually have a skill. (My friend is computer competent and has seen my work.) Nevertheless, I finished my task with a bit of unease. The website is being maintained with an HTML generator. It isn't a bad generator, but the result isn't quite up to the standards that I would consider right.
Just the day before, I was helping a different organization as a volunteer with no specialized skills. I was inventorying a box of miscellany. The employed staff brought out a new laptop computer so that I could type the inventory directly without the need for a low-tech intermediate. The computer, however, had Windows 7 installed, a version of what I call the Mala Vista operating system. After about 10 minutes of trying to work with it, I went out to get a yellow legal pad and a ball point pen. Mala Vista just isn't right.
A couple of days before that, I had been photographing school groups participating in a museum field trip. Taking pictures, watching kids learn, eating a free lunch -- it's hard to imagine a better noon break. Later, I heard that one of the schools informed the museum that they, the school, had a "no pictures" policy and that the school expects the museum to adhere to it. The museum has every reason to be cooperative with the policies of the school, which is their client. But it isn't right for the school to expect an outside organization to modify their activities (or in this case my activities) after the fact.
Yesterday I biked to church and was distressed to find the odor of lawn poisons hanging in the air throughout my entire trip. It doesn't seem right for lawn owners to spread poison into the air that I have to breathe to get to church.
Today my painting contractor came over to confirm colors and operational requirements for painting my living room. I nearly had the room ready for his crew to come tomorrow, but when he was here this afternoon he changed the schedule to Thursday.
What is common to all of these minor annoyances? Am I really feeling depressed about the propriety of these actions? Not at all. What distresses me is that in each case I find that decisions are being made that I cannot control. Worse, these decisions are creating a world contrary to my vision of an ideal and perfect world.
What if nobody programs their own web pages anymore? What if Microsoft succeeds at creating a monopoly? What if all my photography comes to naught? What if anonymous strangers make me sick? What if I have to live with piles of books another day? Will the entire world come to an end? Probably not. Will I be unhappy? Probably so.
The fact that actual reality is not perfect in my eyes is something that I've come to terms with. But that the world isn't inevitably tending toward my vision of perfection remains an annoyance.
If the world were inevitably tending toward perfection, toward my vision of perfection I mean, then I wouldn't need to play the actual reality game. If that were the case, I would win inevitably. But "waiting for perfection" isn't the game we're playing, and coasting without making a play isn't an effective strategy in the actual reality game.