I am in the season of my life where hopes and dreams of my younger years have come and gone, and are giving way to smaller hopes and less dreams. So many goals unfulfilled, so many dreams shattered, so many hopes squashed by life's circumstances. I stand amazed at the way age maturity changes the total outlooks of us as the years of our youth fade into mere memories.The discovery that we have gone steps beyond, now being halfway through our life and the knowledge that we are somehow all of a sudden in the last third of that life, that we long ago thought was somehow going to be everything we ever dreamed and hoped it would be.
More and more I find myself having to face that my earlier dreams were founded by not only youthful innocence but even more so by the ignorance of youth.
As time has gone by I have learned much to my dismay that the road traveled in our life does not become less bumpy and smoother as we continue our steps forward, but the road tends to lead us in circles, merely a culd-de-sac that we follow around and around and around yet again.
That discovery may well become the most disappointing factor of life that I must not only accept, but somehow I am to do so graciously and thankfully.
As a young woman or perhaps it is more fitting to compare myself to an older child, I began my journey through motherhood, filled with the misconceptions that I could and would create a family where all would be perfect in my child's world. I grew up in the era of clean family television shows that depicted perfect homes, perfect families, perfect children and like so many in my generation I bought the media propaganda hook, line, and sinker!
In my life I have lived in my share of the too small houses, tripping over the array of children's toys dreaming youthfully of the day that I would live in a home where we had room for everything and all would then be perfect.I daydreamed of the spotless house, for years. Everyone would have their own room and all their belongings would be in it. The day finally came where everyone had their rooms and for a brief moment in my life history I had a living room that did not look like a storage area for children's toys. And then at some point in time , I can't even recall when it happened their stuff start moving into every available empty space. Suddenly all the things they outgrew moved from their rooms to someplace where I would again trip over an array of unwanted toys and an assortment of their belongings no longer wanted but not willing to be completely parted with. Sadly I also discovered I too had an assortment of those items of my own. Knick knacks that moved into boxes, broken items glued together so many times they were basically made of glue now. Life seemed to continually have me moving from enough room to not enough room.
I have driven my share of clunkers anticipating the luxurious days to come of having the American dream of the perfect car. I have even had my share of perfect at the moment cars.And yet somehow that "oh what a feeling" seemed to elude me. Today I am finally living in that big house and yet I still find myself tripping over an array of children's things. There is finally room for everything and yet nothing seems to have changed. I have had compact cars, family sedans, mini vans, and trucks.I dreamed of having cars we would all fit comfortably in not realizing they don't make those when you have large families, because by the time we add in the sports gear, and the other must have items to the space of the car we are all still cramped into the car. I am now driving a truck that seats 7 with over 200,000 miles on it and dreaming of a day when I can again afford to buy a small car.
I am learning that as we travel along our life's road it keeps taking us to all the same places that we have already been. Much like the way we get in our car and drive along the same roads to go to the same stores, we seem to sit in the passenger seat of our life and take the same roads over and over again.
In the not so distant future I foresee a smaller home and again I will face the living room storage space syndrome. I also anticipate the collections I have gathered through my years being downsized to accomodate what will become yet another start over in the road of my life. Some may say that is the pessimistic side of my nature. My late husband would sometimes say that to me, and my rebuttal was always the same, I am not being a pessimist, simply a realist.
The course of life, the challenges faced seem to also travel around and around the same block of road.
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