If I wasn’t a mommy…

• I’d be a backup dancer~ I still try to shake my groove thing when no one is watching. Sometimes I get caught. Like the time I was attempting the Robot, in the kitchen. Husband walked in while I was doing that pose, you know the one where your elbow is cocked in the air and your forearm swings like its a loose hinge?  If you didn’t get all that, if ever we two should meet, I’ll demonstrate.  Well he walked in and caught me. I jumped, squeaked, and cover my face like he would just disappear if I didn’t see him.  He’s never let me live that day down.
• I’d be a photographer for National Geographic.  And I would write. I used to think I’d marry the writer, not that Husband can’t write but I’m a tad controlling.  I’d of course take his input and “use what I could.” He would just be there with me in the throws of the jungle, lest I was hit on by the pygmies, or something.
•  Maybe I would have a few more triathlons under my belt, maybe not. One in each state.
• Become an anthropologist, and study different tribes in Africa through living with them for years until they accepted me as one of their own. I’d write books about it. I’d be a specialist. Everyone would want me on their talk shows.
• perhaps I’d live on a sailboat, and moor at different places around the world.
•  maybe I’d try out for Reality Television
• maybe I’d be so popular on that show that I’d become some T.V. Host for an obscure cable channel.
• I’d join the Peace Corps

I used to think that if I was old, I couldn’t enjoy traveling.  I think maybe seeing my Grandma pull over at one too many rest stops put the fear in me.  But I felt such a panic to get out and do and see everything before gravity got a hold of me.

I’m realizing now that there are still time for those dreams in my future.  Who DOESN’T want to see a 50 year old back-up dancer at a Gwen Steffani concert?  And I’m really looking forward to traveling with the Husband. He’s never been past the North American continent. He’ll be a great traveling companion, and perhaps the pygmies will still try and hit on me in 20 years.

I am grateful for being out of the rat race. I worked for a great corporation in my twenties but I remember feeling a bit like a mouse on a wheel. (Hence the “rat race” Eve. Duh! and, does anyone say duh anymore?) But seriously, I wasn’t cut out for it. I knew I was just making money to spend it, then make it again. I had no drive to move up the chain. I didn’t want more stress or responsibility.

Although my worries now have the capacity to be the worst they could ever be, like the loss or sickness of a child or spouse, my joys have that same potential.  I wouldn’t understand how happy I could be, if I didn’t have my kidlets. I know I sound sentimental. And maybe one would think that my excitement over my toddler’s first exclamation of “mommy, I poopoos” is only because my day to day life has no other real thrill in it. That could possibly be true.

I like to think of it as I helped create this life and I’m taking this journey with them. I’m  learning to communicate for the first time, through them. I’m seeing the world through these fresh eyes. All three pairs of them. Suddenly that other stuff is comparatively not as exciting.

My 5 year old has never seen “The Ranch” before. We’re going there in 2 weeks. To him that is as thrilling as me travelling to the Great Wall of China. 

One might expect a conversation during with 3, five and under mindless drivel. But I get to hear comments like “If a human is friends with a rhinoceros, it might not turn out so well.” FRESH CONCEPTS! I’m tellin’ ya!

Spaghetti dinner, I’ve had it many times in my life. My children devour it like it’s sugar coated.  And really they’ve only had it a mere 260, 156 and 78 times in their life as oposed to my 1560. It’s also one of the few meals all three agree on and there is a certain satisfaction in nourishing another human life. 

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, out of all the things I’ve done, and all that I could be doing, my wisest choice was to marry a sweet man and raise some kids. I know in the end my joy will be full.