What exactly ebbs and flows? The tides....life. I am learning bitter and I hope at some point - sweet - life lessons as the months go by. When I look at my life today - this dreary winter slushy day, and compare it with what it was even a year ago it is practically unrecognizable, well with the exception of the laundry piles in the basement. C.S. Lewis said this, "You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream." I am a big believer in having a dream and having goals that fit your life and bring you joy and to pursue those goals. I was also a big believer that you can accomplish any goal if you put your heart, mind and soul into accomplishing it. I was always very independent from day one. If I wanted to do something, well, I just did it - I accomplished it no matter what I was told. I was an accomplished gymnast at an early age. One of my earliest memories occurred in the high school gym of our hometown in Audubon, New Jersey. My mother sent me to some one-week camp during the summer. The camp had a gymnastics component to it and I remember distinctly - like it was yesterday - being at camp and having this girl - she was probably in her late teens, working her summer job - spotting me on the balance beam. I did a back walkover on the balance beam. I was probably 6 years old at the time. I will never forget her words to me: "Someday I will see you in the Olympics." I think it was the first time anyone had given me such high praise as that. I was just doing what I knew how to do and she saw something in me that had potential. So I left that day knowing that someday I would be in the Olympics. There wasn't any question, until one day when I was about 11 or so and made the "team" at the gym. The team was a traveling competitive team bringing me closer to my 6-year-old set goal. Perhaps it was fate or just the times or circumstances, but I was pulled from gymnastics by my mother for good. I was told on the ride home from practice that with four kids in the house they just couldn't afford to keep me in gymnastics at that level. I don't remember being upset. I was just numb. I stuffed all my dreams and hopes deep down - out of reach - so that I wouldn't feel the intense hurt it caused to know I wouldn't "make it."
Years went by and I took up other sports like diving at our local summer swim club. I was a natural with my background as a gymnast. Again I had a dream that I could accomplish much as a diver - a scholarship to college perhaps? My coach pulled me aside after my second year diving in the summer league and asked me to continue training through the fall and winter, but this would entail travel about 35 minutes from home two to three times per week. Again, this was a no-go.
As I left home and went out on my own I could make whatever my goals were happen. I never remember not meeting a goal I had set for myself. I was determined to go to school in New York City. Bright lights, big city. I wanted that. My mother, however, did not, but in the end I found a way to get there. I was single, young and found my own apartment in Queens, NY and began attending St. John's University in the fall of 1988. I still cannot believe the guts it took for a 19-year old to travel to New York City alone, not knowing a soul, and make a life. I was not afraid. I don't ever remember being afraid. I just knew if it was my goal it would happen and therefore it did. I worked in the athletic department of the University while studying Philosophy at the University. I lived in a basement "studio" apartment...if you could call it that. I lived with ethnic Indians. I still cannot smell curry to this day without remembering my times in Queens. Where am I going with all of this? I realize that life is dreams realized and dreams unfulfilled.
I have a dream to live in Maine. It's not a crazy, wild fantasy and in fact a dream shared by many folks - single, married, families. I talk to them all. We go there and something gets into our soul that doesn't leave. I have felt this since my first trip in 1997 and have been trying to think of a way to get up there ever since. We were close....closer than we have ever been as of late. I say 'we' because my husband was finally on board with the idea, but alas, it does not seem to be in the cards for us...for me. Perhaps Maine is just my dream. I am not certain it is the rest of the family's dream. My husband has many ties here in NJ; his mom and dad, a brother with whom he is close with, an Aunt and Pop-Pop and so on. He has a good and stable job, something to be thankful for in this horrible economy. Stability is golden in this horrible economy. I can see where moving 500 miles north may not be "his" dream. All my children know is New Jersey. They have roots, routines and lives here. While children are resilient - a move as big as what I was proposing may have far-reaching consequences. I know of which I speak being a child who was moved from school to school to school as a kid. I never stayed in one school for any length of time. I went to public school, Catholic school and Christian school. I would stay one to two years at a time and my parents would pull us out for "something better" which had us siblings scrambling to make new friends and "fit in" once again during our volatile youth years. Switching schools every couple of years was a challenge and not one I would wish on any of my own children. Thankfully, homeschooling has prevented that from ever being a remote possibility.
The reality of the economy under Mr. Barack Hussein Obama and our own personal choices for our budget have rendered us - well stuck. What other word is there? Most homeowners find themselves "under water" at this time. Under water is a term that means homeowners owe more on their homes than what their home is worth. We don't live in a McMansion. We live on a farm in a "raised ranch" which is really just a ranch home with three small bedrooms and a finished basement. It was a finished basement until the flood last year, which destroyed much of the "finishment" of the basement. We - the six children and I and my husband, occupy 1129 square feet at the moment. I honestly do not want to complain, but I would - in my dreams - like to have more than 2500 square feet of living space for this number of people occupying one home.
I took on a full time transcription job with the hopes of helping this family of eight pull ourselves above water to breathe. I have been transcribing medicine since 1998 and am now working on a hospital account. Full time and six kids? Yeah. This too shall pass....I hope.
For now, I will tuck my dreams of Maine inside that place where I put my dreams of being an Olympic hopeful - way down deep where it won't affect me for now, because right now it's about getting through each day, being able to pay the bills and trying to live God's will, not my own - a task, which is not easy for this headstrong Irish gal.
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