Pocketful of dreams

I have always been a dreamer. I remember as a child sitting in my room, concocting elaborate plans for tree-houses that would make the Swiss Family Robinson jealous, penning love stories in numerous notebooks, convincing myself I'd be a renowned novelist by the age of 14, and fantasizing about what it'd be like once I was grown and could make all my dreams come true.
Not only did I imagine that I would have made an excellent Indian princess (after reading the story of Sacagawea) that I would create a vacuum that moved on its own, (as if vacuuming is really that strenuous) that I'd live in a house with swirly stairs and a library (equivalent to being a movie star) but also that one day, this small-town girl would make it to the Big Apple.
I don't quite remember when my infatuation for New York City first came about. If it was after I saw When Harry Met Sally for the first time, which of course made me want more than just to live in New York. It also made me want a best-friend kind of love where he accepted all my eccentricities yet still wanted to marry me. Ah and then there was New York. New York, New York. That beautiful City and all its splendor. The lights, the sidewalks, the street lamps, the street vendors, Central Park, the horse carriages, Saks Fifth Avenue, Tiffanys, the cathedrals, the art gallery's, the museums. I could go on and on. Can't you see? Oh, New York was made for me! I know it... even as I write this, my heart is starting to pound, a sweet staccato.
Every time I hear the words New York, see the taxis flying by in a movie, scan the words as I'm reading a book, it's as if some unseen hand pulls me closer. I can't escape the yearning that has gotten to be an ache. I literally couldn't fall asleep last night because I was so lost in fantasy over what I would do with myself once I lived in my beloved city.
I know I'll make it though. If there's one thing I've become an expert at, it's dreaming. And New York City was built by dreamers. I'm going to fit right in.

Not in Kansas anymore...

In the blink of an eye I went from stomping my feet and complaining about wanting a life of my own, a chance to really spread my wings and see what the world has to offer me and now that I'm getting a chance to try, I am scared senseless. I am no longer a Michigan girl. Actually no, take those words back. This girl is smitten with the mitten and always will be. Wisconsin can never claim me. However, in all honesty I am excited to be here. Being me and my love of all things adventure I am embracing this newness and the possibilities unfolding before me, even if they weren't the possibilities I would've picked, they can still work right? I am deeply distraught sometimes when I contemplate if I can handle this huge start-over. But isn't life made of lots of those? I graduated from high school and moved to college which was new and daunting and I made it through. And somehow I'm doing it again, except this time I really don't know what to expect. There's no curriculum or set time-frame on how my life will pan out or what I should get out of it. I feel like after I graduated from high school I had these huge life expectations that went something like this:
go to college, meet a boy, fall in love, get married, have fabulous career, magical bliss!
And instead it went something like this: went to college, learned a whole lot more about myself than I ever knew, met people who would inevitably change my life in the most meaningful of ways, and then people who hurt me, let me down, betrayed me, but there were those standing in the wings to pick me back up and dust me off, reminding me that unwavering love isn't only found in the romance aisles, and of course I did meet boys, I did fall in love, I realized it's not as easy and as black and white as I always thought, and even the most remarkable plans you have for yourself aren't the same plans that God in fact has in store for you and maybe you should've trusted His judgment all along.
The funny thing about growing up is it's not what you expected it to be. I wrote a letter to myself in the 8th grade and I thought the 22yr old me would be an interior designer married to Joel Wisuri. And back then, this seemed like the most magnificent plan for my life. I couldn't imagine it any other way. But then again, I also couldn't imagine that would I would learn most from my gazillion dollar college tuition is that college still doesn't even prepare you for the real world. I'm not sure anything really does.
So, although I'm not armed with Dorothy's ruby slipper's, I have to say, I am going to brave this new path, because I know it'll take me where I need to go.