Livin' The Dream

I have had this little fantasy – this perfect-life thing – since I was a kid. There would be a Mommy (me) and a Daddy and kids and we would live out in the country and have horses and be happy. I’d paint and cook fantastic meals and learn how to make pies like my grandmother made. My house would be warm and welcoming and smell like propane and dial soap and apples. I’d have flour on my hands and glass door knobs and wood floors and people would want to visit and never want to leave.

There would not, under any circumstance, be divorce. Or fighting. Or poverty.

I think I watched one too many Little House on the Prairies.

So. All grown up, now. Let’s see how that whole fantasy thing worked for me.

Mommy – check.

Daddy – check.

Kids, country life, horses – check, check and check again.

Hardwood floors, propane heat, painting, cooking, pies and glass door knobs – All there.

I would have to say, up until a few years ago, things were going along as planned.  And then they weren’t.

So what’s a girl to do when someone steals her ‘little girl dreams’…  ?

For me it was less like stealing and more like … sharing them with a friend who didn’t take care of them. I thought surely something so valuable would be protected, guarded to the point of death, even.  

Ehhh… not so much. Here’s the thing about dreams: they’re really important, but usually only to the dreamer.  And if they become too important, well, then it’s almost like they’re an idol. The danger comes when fantasy starts to edge out reality.

But you know what? The reality is no marriage is without disagreement. Ours included. I wonder now, if we’d let off a little more steam in the early years, maybe Mt. Vesuvius wouldn’t have come calling after our 20^th anniversary.  After two lawsuits, alcoholism, death in the family, near bankruptcy, and 10 years of drought, somehow, we held onto half the ranch. But in the end, we fought and we divorced. So what? The miracle is we managed to remain friends.

And so what if I don’t have glass door knobs. Chipped enamel suits me fine.

Best of all, when my granddaughters come to visit – they never want to leave. 

I give up on trying to understand why things happened the way they did. 

I think I’m pretty lucky. I got to live the dream for a long time. I hear my the excitement in my granddaughters' voices when they call me Gramma and they want to go feed the cows, I  realize I still have the best parts left, after all!

And heck, if I decide I want glass door knobs someday, they sell them at Home Depot.