It’s a crazy question. And yet, we are all human and we make promises that we can’t keep, because we can’t keep all the variables in our hold. The variables that are the more interesting events that may happen at the same time, the chance that a family member needs our help, the deadlines for work (because work always take priority over everything), the energy levels, the timing of other activities.

We don’t know the risk and rewards.

But what if I did everything that I said that I would do. That if the words slip out of my mouth that they were the truth. That yes, I would go to the book reading on Saturday and the dinner with my parents in the East Bay and help my friends move to a new apartment and wash my car and do my laundry. What if I actually did commit?

Wouldn’t it be a crazy world when our words become meaningful and they are worth something?

That’s what had surprised me the most as a child. That words are only words. “But that’s what she said!” I would scream when I was surprised by lies. “But it was a promise!”

What if all the words that we leak in conversations, the empty promises that seem to pour out of our fingertips could not be taken back? What if they meant something and that we were chained to it? On one hand, that seems like a horror movie where yes, we would still have free will, but we wouldn’t have play, experimentation, and failure? But then again, isn’t the reason that promises become broken is because we are afraid of commitment so words keep falling and falling out, rolling around on the ground until they become forgotten and decay into dust.