When I Grow Up

I wanted to be everything. I still do! Maybe that's my problem.
I wanted to be a dancer until I was 11. They my dad lost his job and we couldn't afford the classes. I started my period and gained 30 lbs. The outcome is obvious there..
At 12 I wanted to be a missionary. I lived on books about Gladys Alyward, Amy Charmicael... any single missionary woman that worked with children. I tried to learn Spanish on my own. Then I discovered boys...
AT 13 I wanted to be a Mom. I wanted to not even kiss until my wedding day. I wanted to have 8 kids, all home births. I wanted to homeschool them all. I even named them. Selah, Luci, Keziah, Lydia Jacob, Louis, Charles, Samuel.
At 15 I discovered my passion for writing, and what I THOUGHT was my huge talent for it. It helped me through the bad times. I have pages of pathetic prose dedicated to all my teenage angst.
Three days before my 16th birthday, we moved to Atlanta and I met Travis the next week. The writing lasted until my first year of college at 17. I was the youngest staff writer ever for the school paper. I got a D in English 101 and was devestated. Apparently the new ciriculum confused Englosh 101 with Polictically Correct 101. I quit college over it. What 17 year old should be living on her own working 2 jobs and going to college anyway? I haven't written since.
At 19, after 3 1/2 years dating, he broke up with me on the phone at 7:30 in the morning. I was on the cordless, looking at my wedding dress at the time. I asked him what he expected me to do with the dress and he said he didn't know. It was Friday, June 13th.
A few weeks later I decided that I should park my 74 VW Beetle at the bottom of the Chatahoochee in the Damn wedding dress. My period was late, and I couldn't face my weakness at giving in. An old friend called and I already had the dress on. WHe asked me to come spend the night and go to church with her, which sounded like a better idea. God touched my heart. I found out I wasn't pregnant that week.As a result, I quit my cosmotology apprenticeship and decided to persue the missionary plan. I spent a year waiting tables and working at my church. I told God that my husband had to take me to dinner at this restaurant the night he proposed. I worked hard to immagine it, knowing that Travis was gone.
The next August (1998) I left for Bolivia and my whole life changed. It was a dream come true. I did it! I loved it! I learned to speak Spanish. I was there for 9 amazing months, loving on street kids.I want to go back...
I came back and there was a new sound director at my church. It was 2 years since I hung up the phone and closed the closet so I wouldn't have to see the wedding dress we bought together. I loved my church. I could have left but he WAS my best friend for those 3 1/2 years. Meybe I could have that back.
Then I had to dance. I learned Salsa and Swing, not the original plan of a ballerina, but I loved it! I was thin for the first time since I was 12. A true size 6! Yes, that is WITHOUT the usual '1' in front of it. I went out with a couple of guys. Only the ones who liked to dance. Looking back, I'm pretty sure they were gay. Travis said I was crazy and that would never dance.
In Febuary a year later(2000), we decided to go 'hang out as friends'. I paid for my dinner and we went in MY car with ME driving. It was great. I missed him. On the way back to drop him off Travis said "I have to tell you something." I kinda got a weird feeling about it and told him maybe he shouldn't. Of course, he did anyway. "I've been praying a long time about this, and God has given me permission to persue you as my wife again." I responded immediately. "That's nice, but I didn't so don't". We saw each other every couple of weeks after that. At lunch on Easter Sunday he asked if we could call this one a date, and I finally said yes. I loved it.
In June I panicked and took a job offer in North Carolina, 5 hours away. I knew that God could make it last if it was His idea, but I couldn't survive in Atlanta again if it didn't. I came back every other weekend because I missed him so much.
He proposed on August 26th. We were sitting on 'Our park table' that we had carved our initials in when we were 18. No one knew about the restaurant, but somehow he took me there for dinner. He had gotten on the internet and figured out how to ask in SPanish. How did he know that was the second most important thing to me? I'd never told a soul. Somehow he knew my soul.
On April 28, 2001. I put on the wedding dress that my mom had protected from my destructive depression. I walked down the aisle towards the most amazing man I've ever met...Jesus was there...