The future that lies before me.

Today, November 29th, is black Friday. & we all know what that means....crazy lines in every store you decide to enter.

Well, I faced those crowds today & did some Christmas shopping of my own.
& as I'm standing in a line (for about twenty minutes), I began talking to the older lady behind me & she asked me where I went to school, where I work, ect. & as I began to tell her that I graduated high school almost two years ago & have yet to make any plans for college she went on her own rant of how important it is to have that little piece of paper saying I've went through college, gotten a degree & now I'm on my way to a big hefty job that's in a thirty story building & I dress in suits every day.

& what do you think I did? I just smiled & listened to her. I listened to her theory of how a women should have a job & work outside the home. Looking back, I wish I shared with her what my dream job is in my life. But, I was fearful of her rejection to the life I've dreamt up since I was a child. Maybe she would have accepted my goals, maybe she wouldn't have. She seemed pretty set on the fact that having a college degree is the best thing you can do in your life. Guess what? It's not.

My dream job is to be a Momma. Seriously. (you can pick your jaw up off the ground now.)

The thought of a future that involves little tiny feet running across my kitchen floors, finger prints all over the bottom of my windows, toys sprung out all over the place, & a husband that always comes home to us at the end of the day, is the best future I can imagine for myself. No, I won't have a college degree, but I'll have children to raise. I'll see their lives unfold instead of just hearing that they took their first steps from our nanny. I'll raise them to be followers of Christ, & to love on their siblings because there will come times in their lives that their siblings are all they have.

The future that I desire might not be ideal for some people or even make sense to them, but to me, it's perfect. It's the life I've seen play out since I was five & my parents gave me a baby doll to play with instead of barbies in our house. I've seen my Momma raise all five of us children, while being a stay at home Mom & mold us into who we are today. I watched my Dad be the man of the house & lead us in the direction of Christ. With the choices my parents made when I was young have molded my future for me & put those desires into my heart.

So, maybe I won't have that sheet of paper hanging on my wall declaring that I have a degree in "....", but, I will have finger painted pictures filling the front of my fridge & walls.
& to me that's greater than any degree I could imagine.

My dream job will come...maybe not tomorrow, or the next day, but it's in these moments, in the conversations I have with people that make me realize what it truly is that I want out of life.
--& that's family.

.Hannah.