Unreached Dreams

My ten year high school reunion was held a few weeks ago. Only a handful of people showed up, but it was still good to see those people and catch up with the goings-on of their lives. The day after the reunion, I was flipping through my journal and came across an interesting entry from the night of my high school graduation.

Without going into detail, the entry talked about my ten year goals. At the ripe old age of 17, here were my 3 'goals': (1) to own an Eddie Bauer Ford Explorer (2) to have a golden lab and (3) to be at my ideal body weight. Yup. Those were my aspirations. Nothin' in there about a career, a family, where I wanted to travel, what kind of person I wanted to become. Just give me an SUV, a dog and shave a 100 or so pounds off me and I was going to be set for life. Let's measure up and see how I've done with regards to reaching those goals.

(1) to own an Eddie Bauer Ford Explorer
Well, the last time I looked in the drive way, there was no Ford Explorer out there. Although I don't have my dream vehicle, I do have a Grand Caravan. Now, some of you might say "whoopdee doo" to a mini-van, but to me, it represents a lot of things. The van represents that I have a family big enough to necessitate a vehicle of that size. The van was purchased to transport my youngest step son around comfortably and I am so incredibly grateful that this little man is in my life. The van also represents that my husband and I have decent jobs because every week or so when I go grocery shopping, I'm able to fill the back with bags upon bags of groceries. So, although some day I would love to have an Explorer to zip around in, I am more than content to have a mini-van as my main mode of transportation.

(2) to have a golden lab
Even though I've always been a cat lover, I wanted a golden lab sitting beside me in my Explorer. While I don't have said golden lab, I am now the proud owner of a Corgi X and I would want no other dog in this world (see "An Open Letter to Shandi's Previous Owners"). Enough said.

(3) to be at my ideal body weight
This last one has been and will continue to be a life long struggle...a struggle between being happy with who I am and what I look like versus believing I should match what I see in the magazines. Every day, I flip flop back and forth between berating myself for not being thinner and being satisfied with what I look like. The one thought that is a constant in this on-going struggle is that my husband, my family and my friends all love me because of who I am, not because of what I look like. If being skinny meant I couldn't have all the current people in my life, then it wouldn't be worth it.

So, I haven't reached any of those goals I set out for myself. And yet, I am content and happy with where and who I am. I'll leave it at that.


And so it happily goes...