That's right. I am a 40 year old freshman. In two weeks I have my first college finals - the first of several dozen over the next three years - and I couldn't be more excited about this opportunity.
You see, when I graduated high school, I wanted to be a performer. I was a member of the choral department all 4 years of my high school existence, and I absolutely loved, loved LOVED being in front of an audience.
During those four years I told my parents of my ambitions, and though they loved me dearly, they told me repeatedly that I probably should not try for such a big dream. "The streets of Hollywood are littered with people with broken dreams," she would tell me in Spanish. "Why don't you become a doctor, or a lawyer... or a pharmacist first. Get a great job, and then you can try to be a performer."
She was, of course, trying to protect me from the eventual heartbreak that hits most people aiming for the stars. I am not 'most people'. I probably would have done well. Or perhaps not, we'll never know unfortunately. Because I was a good boy, and I listened to my mother.
I got a job right out of high school, while I figured out what I wanted to do with my life. I knew I wanted to be on stage somewhere, but I wanted to please my parents. And so, I hit a dead end.
Responsibilities soon took over, and eventually just surviving became a huge priority. I became a workaday peon, living week to week on my paycheck - not progressing any higher because I didn't have the education to back up the "smarts that the Good Lord gave me" is how my Dad would put it.
Now, I'm 40. And as I look around me at friends and family that followed their own paths, and have careers to go with the education and experience that comes with that, it would be easy for me to feel a bit jealous.
I'm not.
Well, to clarify that just a bit - I am a bit jealous of the friends I have that are right now in shows throughout Central Florida. I really do miss being in plays with them. But at the same time, I'm so very happy that I am finally on the path that I should have been twenty-some odd years ago.
...or is that really the case? There is no "should-have". I made a choice. That choice, and countless others have led me here. And of course six months ago, I chose to go back to school - which in and of itself has been an ordeal! But that's for another time, another place.
No, I am finding that the true measure of a person is in accepting the choices that he or she made to place him or her in the now - for "in the now" is all we really have. All that lay behind me is gone - far gone - and it does me nor anyone else any good to give it even one moment's upset.
I have made great strides in the past couple of months, but that is nothing compared to the steps I am taking combined over the next 2 years. I will get my degree. I will receive my diploma. And I know where I am going.
I encourage all of you now: find your path, live your dream, be in the now, love greatly, and smile because it unnerves those who don't know what's going on.
Love,
JC
No comments:
Post a Comment