The Problem With Life

is that---if you're me and you're trying to be practical---you have to do something you don't like in order to be successful, rather than doing something you do like because you already find success in it.  

For instance:

I like writing.  I like singing.  I like drawing and sketching and taking pictures.  Realistically, can I make a descent career out of any of those things?  No---not in a practical sense.  Even though every English and Writing teacher I've ever had has ordered me to become a journalism major, every band I've sang with has told me to do something with my singing, every Art teacher I've been under (well, the only Art teacher I've been under) has told me to go into photography.  I suppose I could do any one of those things if I really wanted to (I'm young!  I can do anything I want to, right?) but I sure as heck wouldn't make a living for myself.  (Side note, just to clarify: I like writing, singing, drawing, and photography, but really I am not brilliant at any of them.  I just like them.  People are too kind.)

Instance number two:

I like animals.  I always have.  But unless I want to go to veterinarian school for 8+ years (which I do not; I would never in my right mind subject myself to 8+ years of school.  8+ years seems like half of a lifetime---almost), than a career in the field of animals is basically out of the question.  I could, instead, become a veterinarian technologist in 4 years, get hired at a large city vet clinic, and make a maximum of $15.00 an hour.  An option that is, yes, but not a very appealing one.  First, because of two words: "big city", and second, because of the maximum number of $15.00 an hour---which is not worth 4 years of schooling, and would not pay for 4 years of schooling.

Solution: Get a job somewhere within the health field---ultra-sound, nursing, x-ray technician, etc.---and be guaranteed a job anywhere, at any time.  Plus good pay.

Problem with solution: I hate math and science.  (Eh... hate is a strong word.  I strongly dislike math, and though I find science very interesting, I am not inclined towards it.  Not anywhere like I am inclined towards Writing and English---and animals.)

How on earth can a girl know what to do when everything she wants to do, she can't do?  At least, not practically speaking.

I practically hate practicality.

C.S. Lewis is a Smart Guy

"It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad."

C.S. Lewis

Photoshoot of the Hankins Homestead

"Of all of our inventions for mass communication, pictures still speak the most universally understood language." -- Walt Disney

Little Woman

I was really put out a couple of weeks ago. I still am, a little bit. Everyone was, and is, leaving. All of my friends are going away to college, and I'm just... here. I feel a bit left behind. It's not that I don't want to go away; to have great adventures; to go to school, gain knowledge, and become "educated". But somehow---probably because I haven't the slightest idea of what to do with myself---I feel caged up. Like I can't go anywhere or do anything, even if I want to.

My mom told me I have always been slow to except change. I'd go as far as to say that I'm afraid of it. Boy---one more thing my "fearless" self is afraid of. But why? Why am I afraid? It's ridiculous to fear what is inevitable. Change will follow me around wherever I go in life, and really, it's a good thing. Right now, I'm just waiting for what will come of the change I'm experiencing in this present chapter of my life. Waiting, waiting, waiting...

Yet I don't feel any better. I hate waiting, especially when I don't know what I'm waiting for.

Watching "Little Women" with Emily last night, I felt as if Jo---the main character---was me. In one scene she rejects a marriage proposal from her best guy friend and is substituted by her younger sister for a trip to Europe with her rich old aunt (something she's dreamed of her entire life), both in the span of one day. Hurt, confused, frustrated, she paces the floor and breaks out in an angry rant as her mother sits and listens.

"Well, of course Aunt March prefers Amy over me. Why shouldn't she? I'm ugly and awkward and I always say the wrong things. I fly around throwing away perfectly good marriage proposals. I love our home, but I'm just so fitful and I can't stand being here! I'm sorry, I'm sorry Marmee. There's just something really wrong with me. I want to change, but I---I can't. And I just know I'll never fit in anywhere."

Gah...!  That's me, folks.  Unsatisfied and wanting more---wanting to be more---but not knowing how to get it, or be it, or do it.

Oh, I am such a lost and directionless little woman. But then Marmee's (God's?) reply to Jo echoes in my over-wrought head:

"Oh, Jo. Jo, you have so many extraordinary gifts; how can you expect to lead an ordinary life? You're ready to go out and find a good use for your talent. Though I don't know what I shall do without my Jo---go, and embrace your liberty. And see what wonderful things come of it."

Grrr.

Alright, I've had it. I'm fed up with not knowing what to do with the rest of my life. Actually, I'd be happy if I knew what to do with the rest of this year!

Potential---for who knows what?---is such a stinkin' bother.

Package

I saw the cutest little girl while working today. Big brown eyes, playful dimples, blonde hair crazy-everywhere on her head. Two-and-a-half-years-old, the youngest of three older brothers, and already being feisty and bossy and telling 'em what to do. She wandered around while her parents were talking to me and examined rocks in the dirt, picked grass growing in tufts from under the sidewalk and threw it at one of her brothers, then came back and pulled on the pant leg of another older brother until he reached down and picked her up.  The definition of independent; yet when I caught those brown eyes of her's looking at me and smiled back, she blushed and hid her face behind her brother's neck.

Gosh... spunky and shy, all in the package of one little girl. God is wonderfully creative, isn't He?