All in the Family

If I'm going to start blogging again, I might as well get going tonight!
After spending some time with family lately, some of whom I rarely see, and some I see all the time, I had a great "a-ha!" moment that caused me to chuckle to myself and simultaneously feel infinitely better about myself and the choices I make in my life. What realization could have such an effect on me? It came to me all at once that I was born into a family of dream-followers and eternal career-changers. Of all my parents, cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents not a one of us has followed a college degree with a life-long career in that same field. Many, many of us have college degrees...but you'd be hard pressed to find a relative of mine who sticks with a job, or even a career, for their entire life. It's been interesting to dissect my family in this way.  It comforts me when I agonize about not knowing what I'm doing with my life yet, to know I'm in good company. I admire every one of my relatives for following dreams, making choices, living with consequences, and pursuing adventures. I have been lucky enough to grow up with the freedom to truly be anything I want when I grow up, and the love and support I need to take my time in figuring it out. Not only that, I know that I don't need to pick a career and stick with it. I'm not bound by the confines of making the "right choice". Nothing is permanent anyways!

I'm at home in the company of teachers, librarians, pilots, electricians, computer nerds, translators, science nerds, maintenance workers, temp employees, retail workers, environmental specialists.... with degrees in linguistics, anthropology, teaching, nutrition, biology, sociology, environmental studies, spanish and some unfinished degrees...and some pretty talented artists, photographers, gardeners, musicians, writers, leather workers, quilters, athletes, dancers, cooks, veterans, travelers, and story-tellers in our spare time! (lots of us span many of these identities and will continue to invent ourselves for the rest of our lives)