They say nothing in life is certain but death and taxes, but I disagree. In my life, there's definitely one other sure thing: the unexpected is much more likely to occur than the expected. I find that whenever I take the time to put some thought and planning into something, the universe often intervenes to disrupt with other plans for me. And, conversely, if I'm busy living with the chaos of daily life with very little thought or planning, the universe often throws in a wicked fastball or a wild curve just to see if I'm paying attention. I like to think that when God granted me the ability to recognize and appreciate humor and irony it was because he was aware that my life would be filled with both.
In a recent Facebook status update, I quoted Dante's catch phrase from Kevin Smith's classic indy film, Clerks. If you don't know the movie, Dante is the manager of a Quick Stop convenient store who's filling in by working someone else's shift and complains throughout the movie, "I'm not even supposed to be here today!"
Sometimes that's how I feel when I look at my life. I, like many other young adults and college students, had a pretty set plan for my life. I was going to study international law and work in the corporate world. I was well on my way, earning a double major in French and Pre-Law at a Big 10 University. I had studied in France and had an internship in a corporate law department waiting for me. Then I met my ex-husband my senior year in college and it all changed...
While I hadn't been entertaining thoughts of marriage and a family, I fell in love and couldn't imagine my life without this guy. When I left Michigan after graduation to return to Illinois and complete an internship, he called me one night less than a week after we had parted and asked me to marry him. I was surprised because he was in the Army and would probably be stationed overseas and I still had three years of law school ahead of me, but we agreed that we wanted to take whatever journeys we had ahead of us together.
Instead of staying in Chicago to attend law school as I had planned, we were married and I moved to Michigan. When I started law school there, I discovered I had no interest whatsoever in international law. I was a strong writer and did well speaking in moot court competitions, so I honed these skills and when I started working, it was in general practice and litigation. My ex-husband ended up taking a civilian job and resigned his commission, landing us in Michigan -- I place I had never intended to stay -- indefinitely. What happened to that job I had pictured as a corporate attorney in the international arena?
When we left Michigan for the East Coast to pursue my ex-husband's career path, I discovered I was pregnant. This took my life in yet another direction that I had not imagined. Becoming a mother fundamentally changed me as a person. And the changes just kept coming...
Today I find myself a single mom working as an assistant editor of a local publication on a little island in South Georgia that I never knew existed before moving here. This is definitely not where I pictured myself when I set out on that path I had so carefully laid a few decades ago. As Dante says, "I'm not even suppposed to be here today!" And, as I explained to a friend, when I say that, unlike Dante, I don't mean that I'm not happy with where I am or that it's a bad thing...it's just so very different than the direction I had imagined my life would take. No Chicago-Paris jet-setting life of corporate meetings and travel. Instead, I have a flip-flop casual lifestyle with a job that allows me to meet amazing people and attend fun events. I enjoy little-hand-in-big-hand morning walks on the beach finding hermit crabs, sunny afternoons in the park and at the pool, and sharing popcorn during movie night snuggles on the couch with content dogs snoring nearby. Not a bad trade, actually.
What those decades of surprise twists and turns on the path of life have taught me is not to fear the unexpected -- it is neither inherently bad nor good, it is just unexpected! I've also learned the importance of being able to adapt to those changes and roll with the punches. As Ann Landers aptly stated, "Nobody says you must laugh, but a sense of humor can help you overlook the unattractive, tolerate the unpleasant, cope with the unexpected, and smile through the day." So, in case you were wondering (or concerned by my abysmal lack of recent blog postings), I'm still smiling and laughing every day!
No comments:
Post a Comment