Show and Tell: What I Wanted to Be

When I was growing up I always loved a good argument.  This meant that I loved to prove people wrong in a debate and I was the nerd who would look up for fun facts to prove my point.  I had this insatiable love for knowledge that eventually I was nick named the encyclopedia of the family.   Whenever someone was stumped over a fact about anything they would joke they could just reference me and not to toot my own horn but I often knew the answer (toot toot).  My dad planted the seed for me to become a lawyer when I was quite young and I went all through school believing that was where I was headed.

I excelled at school and worked really hard to get the grades that would allow me to chose where I wanted to go to university; and I was on cloud nine when I got into every school I applied to and sent my acceptance in to my first choice The University of Toronto (for all my American readers this is the Harvard of Canada).  There is no pre law degree in Canada, you need an honours bachelor degree and then a good test score for the LSAT.  I had settled that I would do a degree in politics and history as a good basis plus I was a huge history nerd.  Then I started university and I had a huge identity crisis.

So many of my friends went into university not knowing what they wanted to do exactly using that first year as a means to tests the waters and come up with a game plan for the rest of their degrees.  Because I was so convicted in what I wanted to do  I kind of crashed and burned when I got to university and realized that a) I wasn't so sure I wanted to spend the rest of my education years becoming a lawyer to then spend hours and hours in a job that I had come to realize I wouldn't enjoy and b) I didn't know what I wanted to do now period which was really scary.

When I realized that the idea of becoming a lawyer was not appealing I had this huge weight lifted off my shoulders.   I had this overwhelming understanding that my father had spent my whole life grooming this idea of becoming a lawyer in my head but that my heart was never really into it.  I don't blame him really, he saw a love of knowledge and debate and fostered it the way he thought I would like and as he saw fit.   But now I was in a sort of limbo and it was immensely scary for someone who craves order and planning.

I decided to go with my heart and added a year to my degree and finish in history and English instead, my two loves really.  I knew that after graduation I had options I could continue on with a master's in my subjects and teach at a college level or I could go into public relations or editorial work.   Once I made this decision things started to fall more into place and the awfulness of the first year was behind me. I started enjoying my classes more and doing well again. I completed my degree with honours and near the top of my class!

Throughout university I had maintained a part time job working for a window and door manufacturer as a sales assistant.  It was definitely not my dream job but I was making really good money that allowed me to finish school debt free.

I sent in applications that summer to a graduate degree in public relations and got accepted to all of them. They were set to start in January and here's where everything changed again.  I had met Gianni during my last year of university and by November of that year I knew that we were headed in the direction of eventually getting married.  So I was at a crossroads.  Accept the degree program that would last about 8 months, of full time school work which wasn't going to allow me to work at all and then get an entry level job, hopefully, at a firm.  Or I could accept the huge promotion my work had just offered me to stay with a very large raise to sweeten the deal.  Knowing that an engagement, a wedding,  a house was in my near future I took the safer route and took the promotion.

Before having children and deciding to stay home, especially the last two years at my job I was extremely unhappy.   I pretty much regretted my decision to get my graduate degree every day.  I worked for a family owned company where the office politics were constant and the nuances of the gossip and in office fighting were sometimes too much to take.  So when we finally got pregnant it was a no brainer on so many levels that I would not be returning once my maternity leave was over.

Now here's where I get cheesy for a minute.  At the end of this journey, the ups and downs, the indisicions I really am where I'm supposed to be and more importantly where I want to be.  Gianni and I had talked when we got engaged that when we started a family the end goal was that I would stay home to raise our children and that hopefully he would be where he wanted to be in his career to facilitate it.  He was, so it was easy to make that life change.  I've always wanted to be a mother.  The moment my little sister was born when I was 22 and I held her in my arms I knew in my heart that this was what I wanted .

So as corny as it sounds I ended up becoming exactly what I was meant to be.  A mother.   Really it's the hardest job of all of them anyway.