Who am I?

Hello Blogging world, sorry it’s been a while.

I know that everyone has their own opinions about Les Mis but I loved this version. I was particularly touched by this song, and have had the tendency to sing it the shower lately.

I’ve been thinking alot about identity. Justin and I are in a bit of a transition period of late, and it is wearing on me. It often feels like the majority of my life is being shelved away for the future, like a box of summer clothes left in a closet somewhere, put off until an undetermined date. We are waiting to hear back from the schools Justin applied to, and it feels like somehow I have been left behind somewhere.

It’s partly my own fault, for deciding not to pursue journalism right away. I think I was sort of depending on that , like I saw myself as a news writer...as though somehow writing news would anchor me firmly in place. Keep me the same. Make me who I am. I thought that’s what I wanted; saw myself reporting , wearing pencil skirts and nerdy-cool glasses…I don’t even wear glasses. It was a dream brought about by chick flicks and a decision made by a 15 year old me. I loved working at the school newspaper, but somehow I just can’t make that jump…don’t want to.

I’ll tell you what I really want to be. I really want to be a mom, a well educated Mom who raises her children up between the grass and the stars. A mom who teaches her kids how to get what they need without depending on anyone but their family and their Father in Heaven. I want to be a poet. The kind who lives out in the middle of nowhere and is inspired by the things around her. I want to be a painter. I want to go walking and discover the world as it was made for us. Not as we made it. I want to be a life-long runner. I want to be a coach. I want to be a good friend. I want to work for the city like I do now. I want to be a leader in my Church and in my community. I want too much. I don’t want enough.

Can one person really want all those things, be all those things? I think we all know the answer is yes. People are multi-faceted, complicated beings after all. I’ve learned that as I’ve listened to grandparents and great grandparents ( my own and others ) tell their stories. When it’s all said and done none of us will just have been an accountant or an artist or a Grandma. We are all those things.

Despite my meandering thoughts on the subject, I still feel like I am losing myself. My life is hinged upon Justin’s application status. I don’t know where I’ll be working, or in what field. I don’t know if my baby will have to wait another year to come into this world. I’m waiting, nervously, to see where life will take me.

That is as it should be, I guess. Life rarely lets us take the wheel. However much control you think you have will have changed by tomorrow. You’ll panic, you’ll stress out, and then you will add another title to the ever increasing list that makes up who you are.

I am a writer. A runner. A Mormon.  A video editor. A wife. A friend. A blogger. A daughter. An animal lover. Everything I was, everything I am , and everything I will be makes up a seemingly arbitrary scribble. Trace the pathway of my life and you will find only one common denominator. Me.

Embrace who you were. Love who you are. Strive everyday to be better.

Watch Les Miserable. Write blog posts about it.

And then smile, and know that you’ve found yourself again.