Dream

What did you want to be when you grew up?

I remember being on a kid's show when I was a child. Part of the show was that you walked through a door and whispered in the host's ear what you wanted to be when you grew up. I said "nurse". I have no idea why. I never wanted to be a nurse. It was the thing that girls said in the early 70's. Little did I realize that in just a couple of years I would become obsessed with archaeology and paleontology. I traced pictures of dinosaurs in my spare time. I loved digging in the dirt to find things. One evening, I swore at the dinner table that I would someday have my name on the front page of the newspaper. "Dr. Brenda Smith Finds Missing Link!" Along the way, other subjects grabbed my attention. Psychology, primatology, writing, theology and anthropology. When college arrived, I was set to soar into all of it. I loved anthropology. Studying people and cultures was fascinating. Along with that came theology. Most cultures are religion driven. I took a paleontology course. For primatology, I had to get through biology and zoology. Psychology was a breeze for me. I was always taking creative writing, poetry and literature courses. I found out the hard way that science was torture for me and math was just plain death. That cancelled out primatology as a career. It also took away parts of paleontology and anthropology and psychology. Who knew you needed math for psychology? Damn them! Feeling that I could not truly fulfill those fields, I embraced theology and writing. I took religion courses and continued writing. Suddenly, I realized that there was absolutely nothing I could do with a degree in theology. I would not have my own church, I couldn't handle giving a presentation in college without having an anxiety attack so that ruled out teaching. What did that leave? Writing. I was going to be an author! Journalist! Book writer! Poet!

Reality here.

Guess what happened. Life.

I fell in love, I had my heart broken, I had untreated bipolar disorder, all of my dysfunctional past crept up on me, I fell into a drastic depression and drank myself into academic probation. School became unimportant. I had enough college credits to be considered a junior, only one year shy of my bachelor's degree. I dropped it all. I let it slide between my fingers like sand. All of that studying, all of that money, all of that energy. Gone.

All of my favorite subjects continue to be a driving force in my life. I love people and cultures, I love learning about religion and discussing the possibilities, the great apes are amazing and I could sit and watch them for hours. Psychology is a huge chunk of my life in so many ways. Funny enough, Joshua wants to be a paleontologist when he grows up so I somehow passed that gene on without knowing it. I can live through him when it comes to dinos. I've written plenty of short stories and poems. A child's book. I've sent numerous ones into publishers only to be rejected time and again. I know that it takes forever to get anything published, unless of course you are a celebrity. But, I don't handle rejection well so I stopped submitting anything.

I am not sorry for what I do in my life now. I know that I have important responsibilities. But just thinking back to those dreams...I wonder what would have happened if I had followed through on any of them. I don't feel regret really, just wonder.

What did you want to be when you grew up?