It's so funny. When you're young, especially around the time you hit 18, you think you know everything there is to know about life.
My dad used to joke about it with me, telling me when I was in high school and was going through the type of rebellious streak that many teenagers experience, that he appreciated me trying to make his and mom's life easier (harder?) in trying to convince them that I knew it all, and didn't need their guidance.
You learn very quickly once you get out into the real world, however, that you indeed do not know all there is to know, though you're loath to admit it to your folks.
SEE ALSO (VIP): Always Be Yourself
If we're blessed, we mature as human beings as we go along in life, learning from experience and through trial and error processes, dusting ourselves off and moving forward when things go wrong. We take the lessons learned from our mistakes and mishaps and apply them to future situations to (hopefully) ensure things go right the next time around.
Who we are and what we want to do in life sometimes change over time, too, landing us in situations we didn't envision when we were younger and "knew it all."
When I graduated from high school, I wasn't super sure what career path I wanted to take, but at the time, I knew it likely wouldn't involve writing, which I had been doing since I was 12 years old. I didn't think I had the talent to make a living out of it, so I went to college to get an education in my second loves: radio and TV.
I told myself at the time I made that decision that the plan was to get my degree, land a good radio job where I got to play music to help pay the bills, and then get married and raise a family.
As it turned out, my radio career was relatively short-lived once I graduated. But the talk radio job I had (which was not the music DJ gig I had originally hoped for) opened my eyes in other ways and did help guide me in a direction I'd already started turning while in college: towards conservatism.
Though there have been significant others, the "family" part of the dream just didn't happen. Though some partings of ways on that front were on friendly terms, others were due to my increasing impatience with repeated foolishness and gameplaying, not just with relationships but also with life in general, because the older you get, the less time you have for that.
As it turns out, some of the low and difficult moments of my life helped pave the way for where I am now. Successive administrative jobs led me to the last one I had, which I stuck with for 18 years before I was laid off. At that point, I took a chance on a writing career, at long last, using a little nest egg I'd built up from side-gig writing jobs during my admin days as my back-up income if needed.
The writing career, which I sometimes still pinch myself over, has allowed me to do what I have always loved to do while having the schedule flexibility to be a caregiver that I wouldn't have if I worked in an office. And being married with children would have made caregiving for mom much more of a challenge.
So, reflecting back on my out-of-high-school plan, I'm not doing anything I thought I'd be doing. Instead, I'm doing something to support my mom and myself that I previously didn't think I had enough talent to do successfully. Life, indeed, is sweet.
Though my original life plans have changed, where I am now is God's plan for me. I am where I'm meant to be. Each day, I say thank you to Him for the blessing of being able to provide and care for mom while still putting my mark on the world through my writing, and for the lessons in strength and faith, which in turn have made me appreciate life all the more.
DIVE DEEPER: To take a look at my previous Caregiver's Diary entries, please click here. Thank you!
