I love thinking about my various responses to, "What do you want to be when you grow up!?"  I don't remember saying it, but my kindergarten teacher recorded my response to that question as, "I'd love to work in a gas station.  That looks like so much fun!"  Through the second grade, I wanted to be the first woman President, until I realized I couldn't because I wasn't born in the United States.  From the 7th grade on, I've wanted  career in medicine.  I read Dr. Ben Carson's biography and I wanted to go to Johns Hopkins and be a doctor.  I eventually narrowed it down to a career in epidemiology.  I wanted to work for the CDC and wear one of those snazzy yellow biohazard suits.  I think that career choice is courtesy of, "The Hot Zone" about the Ebola epidemic. And then my mathmatically challenged self took Chemistry in college.  I studied for that class - EVERY DAY.  Every Friday we had a test - which means that I couldn't go out with my friends Thursday nights.  I was always sitting in my room trying to figure out why I couldn't balance the stupid chemical equation formula thing.  Chemistry was the needle in my medical dream bubble.  After that I took general classes the next year and then I took an 8 year (?) hiatus from college all together. 

Growing up, I never said or even thought that I wanted to be an administrative or executive assistant.  Sure, I want to help people - but I want to help people on a different level.  I want to feel like I am making a difference, not doing something that someone else thinks is beneath them or is just too lazy to do themselves.  So while I am not aspiring to be a doctor or an epidemiologist or anything that requires 10+ years of college, I would like to get into medicine, something in the public health arena.  I can still get a job with the CDC or with the Red Cross.

I just want to do something that is fulfilling.  At the end of the week, when I am totally exhuasted I want to know that all of my energy was spent helping deserving individuals/families.  Hmmm . . . but as I say that, I am sitting here totally exhausted and I know that all of my energy was spent helping my own family.  Parker and I have settled into a nice little routine and he and i very much enjoy our time that we get to spend together.  The extra time that I have with Stewart is showing in his studies.  We have more time to do his homework and to concentrate on spelling.

I guess there are pros and cons to everything.  I'd like to think that I am enough woman that I can help my family and be the mother and wife that they need as well as being able to help other people.  If I sit down and really think about myself and my personality - I have always wanted to help.  I would step up in my grandmother's kitchen and ask her if she needed help.  I would take ice water out to my dad while he was mowing the lawn.  I'd open my mouth and over commit myself at work because I didn't want to be seen as someone that wasn't a team player.  I think I am ALMOST at that point in my life where I know myself well enough, where I know my own abilities and strengths, and where I understand the professional environment enough that I think I can sit down and actually say, "this is what I want to be now - because I am all grown up!"

I almost think it is unrealistic to force kids into college straight out of high school.  How can you pick a degree, a profession when you don't even know yourself?  I think about all of the people that I know that have gotten their degrees in one area and are now persuing a career/furthering their education in a completely different area.  I think kids just need a little life experience before they make the time and finacial commitment to an college degree.  Oh I know, you have to have the little paper to get a decent with a decent salary.  And I can't tell you how difficult it is trying to finish school now - but I'm almost glad I waited.  Because now it means more and I think I have a goal in sight.