Monday, April 23, 2007

04/23/07

I knew what I was going to do with my life. I was going to be an attorney and enter the world of politics. I didn't aspire to be president, governor of California was fine by me. My goal was to help people.

I had everything planned out to the T. I knew how each of my days would go. I would drop the kid(s) off at day care so I could be in the office by 7 and pick them up by 6-7 at night. An hour or two was more than enough time to bond each day.

This was my plan from the time I was in 3-4th grade until I was about 17-18. Then, I emerged from the cocoon I had built myself.

I realized that politician's don't always help people. I realized that children are amazing and an hour or two a day was not at all sufficient nor was it acceptable. Even today I realize that 24 hours in a day with a child is not nearly enough. That time flies by faster than a speeding bullet and leaves you forever.

I learned that the best way to help people is to have a happy and healthy family. To make sure that you are a contributing member of society. Helping the world starts just one person at a time.

By the time I was 21, I learned that things don't exactly happen in the order you set out for them to. I had planned on getting married, living the newly wed life for a while and then having babies. Well, one day, I woke up and found out I was pregnant. Although Dusty and I lived as man and wife we were not. We had always planned it and talked about it, but it was not yet a bridge we had crossed. Now, I've heard some say that Dusty was forced into marriage (after 5 years of dating, 3 living together) because of this pregnancy. But, those people don't know Dusty very well lol! I can't force Dusty to take out the garbage or do something as simple as actually put a plate in the sink so there were not any shotguns at our wedding!

Once we were married, family started to take on a different meaning. Dusty and I shared no blood relation (obviously lol!) but we were a family. When kaitlyn was born, I began again to question what the meaning of family truly was.

I began to wonder what made family? Was it sharing DNA or was it experiances.

For example, had some Days of Our Lives crazy stuff went down and I found out that when I went in to have a filling replaced my eggs were stolen and used to create a baby that was raised in a village in Africa, would I know that child if I saw them 18 years later? Would I have a motherly bond with the child?

How much of my love with Kaitlyn occured before birth? How much of that sense of motherhood and bonding is attributed to the 9 months she spent in my belly growing, eating, kicking and depending on me until the day came when I physically pushed her into the world?

Anywho, I have learned something about the meaning of family.

Family is first born from blood relations. It is these blood relations that allow us to grow up in environments with people who are and will become our family. However, it isn't blood alone that creates families.

Families are people who have a sense of love, connection and respect for eachother. People in families share so many experiances with one another that no one could ever understand or be a part of. Those experiances, those memories make families what they are. Those memories allow people to grow together and trust one another. Many times, people in families are not of blood relation. They are people that have been "adopted" into the family one way or another, be it at birth, adolescence or adult hood.

Family is the greatest treasure that we have and it should be placed on the highest of pedestles.

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