Today I'm 49

When I was younger,
I used to think I'd be "grown up"
when I was in sixth grade.
I'd squint my eyes and look into my bedroom mirror,
trying to imagine what I'd look like
all grown up,
in the sixth grade.

Of course by the time I got into
High School,
my ideas matured
and my wonderings about the future
included who I'd marry,
where we would live,
and how many children I would eventually have.

I never imagine the journey my life
has taken.
There's just no way
a little kid from Miami, Florida
who used to sit on the hot sidewalk
in my barefeet
squishing ants with my toes,
and trying to whistle thru a blade of grass,
can imagine realistically
all the adventures awaiting her in Life.

I knew I wanted to travel.
I wanted to go to California,
and to New York,
and to Great Britain,
where my mother's family
is from.

I wanted to learn things
beyond Spelling Bees and Algebra.
I wanted to figure people out,
what made them tick,
what made them do the things they do.

I wanted a home and a family.


I'm 49 today.
I have lived all over the United States--
from Florida to the Carolinas,
west to Missouri,
south to Texas,
further west to Arizona,
north up to Utah
northeast to Idaho,
and smack dab in the Rockies,
I have ended my journey in Colorado.

I'm going to die here.
Because if I have to leave here,
I will pretty much die.
I'm co-dependant on Pike's Peak.
I look at it every time I go outside.
It's true.
I look at from my kitchen table,
and when I'm doing the dishes.
Like a magnet in my being,
I am drawn to the strong rock of the West.

I watch for thunderstorms to gather
or snow storms to sweep over
the majesty of the Peak.
I love it. It's home to me.
The girl inside feels tucked in,
when the night draws,
and I am at the foot of that great mountain.

As for being a Mother,
I recall roommates who spoke of having large families
and I wanted none of that.
Being the eldest of five,
and the only girl,
I wasn't sure I wanted more than two kids.
And one of them had better be a girl,
or I would have no more than two.

But then I got my patriarchal blessing,
and it said I'd have both sons and daughters.
Cool. I thought.
I'll have four.
And we did...
boy
girl
boy
girl.

But there were more to come
and I knew that.
I am the happy mother of seven children.
Each has blessed my life
and worn me out in ways
I couldn't have fathomed
when I was squishing ants with my toes.

My motherhood defines me.
I am nothing at 49 years old,
that better describes me,
than the word,
"Mother."

My own parents have been absent 3/4's of my life.
My brothers have long been silent vines attached to my underbelly,
but not visible or active in my reality nor am I in theirs.
I am not a daughter to anyone but a Heavenly Father.
I am more a sister in Church
than a sister of four brothers.

I am a wife because I chose to be married.

But I am a Mother for all of Eternity.

I have been to California several times.
More than I can recall.
I have been to Great Britain three times.
I've never been to New York,
other than the airport there,
for a connecting flight to Montreal.
But hey!
I never even dreamed about Montreal,
so there's a bonus!

Many adventures so far could be classified into the
"Bonus" section.
I've met wonderful loving people all over the world.
People who changed me,
lifted me,
inspired me to lift myself.

People I have come to call true friends
as I have been invited into their lives,
and allowed to serve with what little I had to offer.

So yeah, my life is way more exciting and joyful
than I ever thought it was going to be.

Today I'm 49.
I'm working all day,
then the family is going out for dinner
to a local indian food restaurant.
And tonight,
I'll close my eyes and sleep in the arms of
my husband,
in the bed my son was born in,
and my daughters come to lie in beside me,
in the shadow of the great Pikes Peak
which is a long ways away from that house
on Penny Lane where I grew up.