Living Out Loud. ( v10). When I grow up.

When I was in elementary school I wanted badly to be an astronaut or an archeologist. By day I dug for fossils and dinosaur bones and at night I’d pull the telescope out under the stairs and aim it for the moon.

By the time I hit high school I really sort of lost all hint of aspiration and I entered the college years with no clue of what I really wanted to do. Winning the award for Most Jobs Held Since Graduation at my high school reunion wasn’t exactly an honor as much as a joke. But I’ve never lived a linear life, and having practically as many jobs as I have years is proof of that.

I went back to college because I felt the need to be a “somebody.” I busted my ass through fulltime coursework and a fulltime job and graduated with a high GPA. But I still didn’t know what I wanted to “be” and I still wasn’t a “somebody.”

For awhile I thought being somebody meant fitting into the corporate mold, having a high-powered career. And for some people, that may be true. But I felt like a kid playing dress-up in my suits and pantyhose. I was in someone else’s skin. I wasn’t good at being a “somebody.”

So I decided to do what I liked: movement, physical exercise, fitness. I always went back to them when I needed to be in touch with myself. I wasn’t making much money, and lots of my clients were “somebody”, but I found I was a lot more comfortable in workout clothes than career-apparel, much more at home in a weight room than a board room.

That realization freed me to lighten up, take a chance and rediscover the things I’d loved when I was a kid, mainly writing and photography. I’ve pulled those things together, fitness, photos and words, and now, in one way or another, I do what I love and I love what I do.

Am I what I want to be when I grow up? Not by a long shot. But, I’m still growing up. And its who I am that matters more than what I am. And I’m definitely a somebody. And I’m still digging. And I’m still aiming for the moon.