Five Things

After reading the answers to this meme on several blogs, I can't remember who, if anyone, tagged me for it, because I'm old, you know, and my memory is going. It got me thinking, though, so I decided to give it a try, anyway.

"What are five things in your life now that you would never have thought would be in your life when you were 25?" I do remember being 25 (my long-term memory is just fine, thank you very much), and there are many things in my life that I never dreamed of back then.

1. I was married at 22, and after two miscarriages, I feared that I would never have children. However, in another year, I was the proud mama of a baby girl (Kell), and two years later, Jay came along. They are the two best things that ever happened to me, and through Kell, I also acquired a son-in-law, Allen. He'd be the third best thing.

2. At 25, it would never have occurred to me that I'd be divorced before age 40. I enjoyed being a stay-at-home mom, but it was necessary to go to work, so I got a job. My divorce made some other unsavory things necessary, such as learning to pump gas and deal with automobile repair, not to mention taking out the garbage. I gave Jay garbage duty as soon as he was tall enough to reach the top of the garbage can outside.

3. I never really wanted to live in Harrison. But, after the divorce, I made the decision to stay so the kids could be near their father (snort). Looking back, I realize I wasn't doing them any favors, but I thought it was the thing to do at the time. Also, I didn't want to move back to Little Rock and have the hassle of bussing the kids to school and worrying about their safety all the time. In Harrison, they could ride the bus home and let themselves in and do homework for forty-five minutes, until I got home. This was important, because I couldn't afford a sitter every day, and back then, we didn't have after-school day care. And, now, I'm too rooted to leave.

4. I thought computers were much too complicated for me. My boss, at the time, thought differently. He presented me with an IBM desktop and printer, and said, "Now, make me some graphs." Huh? I found out he was just as technologically challenged as I, and I'm confident that he never learned anything more than sending e-mails to his daughters, if that. He was guilty of the same thing that most of the management types were guilty of in those days. They thought computers couldn't be hard to use if their secretaries could use them. Talk about a trial by fire! I wept and pounded my desk and raged until he finally gave in and brought someone in to give me, and the one other woman in the office who was similarly outraged, classes in the various programs. Then, of course, we were expected to teach all the other women in the office.


5. On the other hand, when I was 25, if I had known that I would have had the opportunity to go to Scotland and England at age 61, I'd have dismissed it as a pipe dream. But, it happened. Kell and I and two other women friends went and had a great time. If I thought that changing anything that happened to me before that trip would have resulted in our not going, I wouldn't change a thing.

I'm sure there are many other things I would not have been able to predict, but there you have the highlights.

I'm not tagging anyone, but if you want to do a little trip down memory lane and do this yourself, I'd be happy to read what you have to say.