"Life Begins at 25"

Look - I know what you are all thinking..."good grief, put some mittens on that girl so she can't keep typing". Fortunately I've narrowed down the cause of today's bloggerrhea to one of two things:

First...Living alone for 4 years has finally taken its toll on me and I just need someone, anyone, everyone to make conversation with me. But then that can't be it because when you get tired of reading all you have to do is click that magic little "x' in the upper right corner of your monitor and I'm gone. Nevermind the fact that these are all one-sided conversations and no one is talking back to me. Which I don't enjoy because I'm really more of a listener than a talker. Really.

Or...I have to put together a powerpoint presentation on how the military is a provider of adult education before my class on Monday and read boring books until my eyeballs fall out of their sockets. Ahh...suddenly the excessive blogging makes perfect sense. Perfect sense to waste time so I'll be stressed out by Sunday afternoon. Actually it does for me because I work much better under pressure.

So what is it that I'm blabbering about now? Oh yes. Life. And my motto of how it begins at 25. I alluded to this in an earlier post so it should be no surprise that I've chosen this moment, when I'm delaying the inevitable class work, to write about it.

Until my sophomore year of college I had my life completely planned out. After graduation I was going to return to my hometown, live on my family's land, teach math at the high school I graduated from all as the new wife of the high school baseball coach. Now at the time I had no idea who said baseball coach was going to be, but that didn't matter...I was certain everything was going to fall into place. Because that's just how life works for good little girls who grow up to be math teachers. But then I failed Calculus. (Up until that point I had never made anything below a B on any of my report cards and suddenly I had a big fat "F" with zilcho quality points to factor into my GPA. Super.) So needless to say I changed my major during my sophomore year and other things began to change as well. During that spring semester I realized that I wasn't going to move back home after I graduated from college. Now, one may ask "how did you know that?" Well, I don't know, but I just did. And because of this new knowledge I was more homesick during those few months than any other time throughout my college career. Which led me to begin wondering...if I'm not going back home after I graduate, then what does that mean for the rest of my plans?

Somehow the next two and half years passed in what seemed like about 30 seconds and suddenly I'm a college graduate who began her first real job the very next day after graduation. It goes without saying that on my first day of work I did not wake up in my own home and share the paper with my husband over breakfast before commuting to work together and sneaking one last smooch in the teacher's lounge before going our separate ways for the day. Instead I woke up in Dahlonega, GA feeling kind of like a failure. (I know...illogical, but we'll get to that in a moment) My best friend, Shelley, had gotten married 4 months earlier and she was off living her new married life. Suz was off in Atlanta living the life of a working girl in the city and while Mag was still in Dahlonega, she was in PT school which I'm convinced was located under a rock because we lived one block away from each other and I never saw her. Seriously. So I wondered things like where did I go wrong? Why didn't my plan turn out? It seemed like a pretty good one with no completely unrealistic expectations. And although I eventually settled into my life, I continued to ask myself these questions for about the next 2.5 years.

2004 was a big year filled with many milestones. It was the year that I turned 25. It was the year that I started living sans roommate(s). It was the year that I was in 4 weddings in a period of 6 months and attended I don't remember how many others. It was the year 3 of my closest friends, one being Shelley, became mothers for the first time. It was the year that I finally became comfortable in my own skin and happy with the life that I was living. So in a sense, my life began. Hence the motto.

Back in 2003 at the naive age of 24, I was pretty much dreading the next year. I thought that 25 was so old. I mean that's practically how old Sarah was when she had Isaac, right? And there I was without an Abraham in sight. I was completely nervous about living by myself. What if I fell one day trying to change a light bulb and no one missed me for days? What if a hornet got trapped in my apartment with me? (ok that really happened and it was scary) What if I made it ok all by myself? (I know, illogical...but we'll get to that in a moment) As for all the weddings, I wasn't so much nervous about making 4 trips up and down the aisle because I had had plenty of practice in 7 previous weddings. For those of you keeping count at home, it's 11 weddings with 11 dresses. And I loved each experience and am still honored that I had those opportunities. It was just that friendships change a little bit with marriage (as they should) and the same goes for when friends have babies. So 7 friends with major life events all occurring between the months of May and October was a lot for a girl to take in. Especially when I was still living in Dahlonega...the very town I swore I would never remain in after graduation back in oh, 2001.

Then 2004 happened. And all of these milestones started taking place. The first being my birthday in March when I realized that I kind of liked the number 25. A good, solid number. Plus, I could rent a car. I was so busy with showers and parties for my girls that I never really thought twice about moving into my new apartment. In fact, coming home after a crazy busy day to no one but my morbidly obese cat was kind of nice. And I felt no guilt about having fancy dresses and strappy shoes strewn out all over the place either. They were in no one's way but mine. Somewhere in the middle of all of the matrimony madness it dawned on me that if I was 1. already married to Mr. Heather Page (teeheehee) 2. changing diapers or 3. choosing my own bridesmaids, I would have missed out on a lot during such special times with such special people. Also during this time I finally admitted to myself and everyone else that I absolutely loved living in Dahlonega. Sure I did not plan to live there forever (and what do you know...I didn't) but it is a great place. Turns out I was actually doing pretty cool things with my life. Things that I would have never had the opportunity to do had I been stuck in Hickory Flat teaching the quadratic formula and tripping over smelly baseball cleats.

Now that I'm 6 months shy of 30 (gulp) and looking back over the past 7 or so years I can see even more clearly why things did not work out like I had planned. For one, I feel as if I'm a completely different person now than I was when I was 22. I had no idea what I really wanted in life at 22 and let's be honest baseball players-turned-coaches kind of lose their charm (and their physique) throughout the years. If I had built a home-sweet-home on my family's land, that home would have been bulldozed down last year because we sold that land and a subdivision now sits on it. I would have never moved to Athens and met the friends I have made here nor would I have Cash, the wonder Lab. These are just a few of many things.

There is nothing magic about the age 25. But that year of my life was a very special and important one. It was the year that I realized that it's not "either/or", but "and then". As in, I can do all of this single-girl-Miss-Independent stuff and then have a family. One day. When it's time. A time not to be determined by me. It was the year that I said "you know what, I'm a pretty ok gal and what you see is what you get. 'I'm good enough...I'm smart enough....And doggone it, people like me.'" Sometimes I refer to it as the Stuart Smalley year. Not really.

While the road to this point in my life was filled with a few curves (and detours, undoubtedly caused by my own doings), I'm glad that I traveled it and I'm glad that it has brought me here. I really am. The reason why is because it was necessary so I can continue to become the person God wants me to be in order to what He has called me to do. Isn't that our purpose after all?

"Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the LORD's purpose that prevails." -Proverbs 19:21