I used to have so many youthful dreams. Isn’t that exactly the way it should be? I can run through an eclectic list of highly unlikely “When I grow up, I want to be …” dream jobs dating back to early elementary school. We all grow and change, thankfully. I would be very disappointed to wake up one day and discover I had actually become the veterinarian I wanted to be when I was ten.
So what did I pick? I’m a teacher. I love it. While I haven’t been a paid employee for many years, I am far closer to retirement age than hot-out-of-college entry level job age. As much as I love learning knew things, I don’t have even a sliver of desire to get another degree. I am excited about doing more writing and speaking, but I don’t desire to be some super star author, which is good because I don’t want to put in the required work to get there. I mostly want to write from home in my Pjs and have enough time to go outside and take long walks through the woods.
What was my big dream in childhood? To be a wife and mother. When Jay and I were getting married, we dreamed of our future together. I wanted 3-4 kids. I wanted to adopt. (Check, check, check.) We poured over catalogs and looked at property. I wanted to live in a log cabin in the woods and raise kids that climbed trees and waded through the creek. Instead, we bought a house on a tiny lot in the suburbs. It wasn’t my dream, but it’s a good life. Now, my “raising kids” years are nearly complete. Our house is a good house for growing older in. I’m no longer thinking about a dream home. If I move now, I’m looking for a house that requires even less maintenance. I don’t want to put a burden on my kids when they are grown with families of their own.
What dreams I do have are simple. I want to travel, a lot. That’s not the kind of dream you have to set goals and work towards. I have a desire to be more creative, finding release in the arts, cooking, and music. I want to own a piano again and actually have the time to play it. I want to learn knew things, but casually and just for fun. I want to serve and minister to others, but I no longer have dreams of starting a group home, developing a charity, or having a career in social services. I want to build relationships over cups of tea, not through some harried venture aimed at saving the world.
My dreams are dreams of peace and rest. I yearn for depth of relationships not breadth of influence. I dream of to-do lists filled with books to read and movies to watch and foods to cook and places to see. I feel a twinge of guilt that my dreams are more self-focused than other focused. It’s not that I don’t want help others, I just don’t want to run my own organization. I want to volunteer at one place consistently so I can build relationships. I want to befriend new mothers who need a hand, and older women who need a companion. I want my life to be about others but in a more subtle, simple way.
So, now in my middle age, my dreams are small, and that feels so very refreshing.
