It's Only My Fault

I think I’ve told myself the same old excuses long enough. I didn’t get a bachelors degree because my parents were not supportive enough, I’m not being named the youngest supreme court nominee this week because my parents didn’t tell me to set big goals, I’ve never been out of the county (well except Canada but does that really count?), because of, you guessed it, my parents.
My parents were too busy trying to pay rent and dealing with more than their fair share of hard times to ever dream big for me. I had big dreams but they never really seemed to care. I think I’ve used their not caring as my excuse not to do it. Instead of trying I took the easy route. I got an easy job, an associate’s degree from the local college, got married and settled into a life I never dreamed of having. A stay at home mom with 4 kids and a hard working husband, I’m 34. If you would have asked the 8 year old me just where I would be now I would have said, "just coming back from a trip to the moon or even Mars", the 12 year old me would have said, "writing for some big magazine about all my distant travels, India, Tibet, and Ireland". If you would have asked the 17 year old me I know for sure I would have told you working on Broadway, The Great White Way. Theatre, the love of my life then and now. I would be living under the magical glow of the NYC city lights where every ethnicity and religion lives. I love the diversity of New York City and even more, I love the food. Yet here I am, a mere 25 miles from the place I was born, my most adventurous food, the sushi restaurant around the corner that has a roll named for my husband (we eat there a lot).
One of the first things I said on the day my son Flynn was born was, “He’ll work for National Geographic and travel the world, and then marry a nice Indian girl so we can have a weeklong wedding celebration in Mumbai”. I told several people what he’d do until one day my friend’s husband politely suggested that perhaps I let Flynn choose what he might like to make of his life. He was right, I was going to pressure my kids to do all the things I wanted ( I never wanted to marry an Indian woman but a nice man from Kenya would have been high on my list). While I still hold out hope that Flynn travels the world, marries someone other than a boring white woman like myself, I’ve decided to take matters into my own hands and quit blaming my parents for the things I’ve not accomplished.
I love my life, I am so truly blessed, but it needs some adventure, so I’m beginning by taking my first international trip next month, to Guatemala. A lot of volunteer work, a little coffee plantation touring, some Mayan studies, and definitely eating some latin food. Who knows where I’ll go after that, but I do know that if I never leave the USA again, it will be no one’s fault but my own.