Tuesday 10

I baby sat at the gym yesterday and the little girls wanted to watch Sleeping Beauty. I love that movie. It appeals the romantic in me. As we watched it, I thought about how the hero and heroine have so much potential, and it made me little sad. Strange reason for melancholy, no? They are young, they are privileged, and they are beautiful. A chance meeting in the woods has the possibility of being life-changing. So many possible choices, so many paths before each of them. Upon reflection, I think the bit of sadness I feel stems from a long-term, ongoing mourning for my youth and potential. Now, I hope you don't misunderstand me. I have made decisions I am at peace with. I truly love my life, my husband, my children. I would not change a thing. The loss that I mourn is not the alternate lives I could be leading, but the possibility of those alternate lives. When you are young and beautiful and privileged (as we all hope we are, right?) you can do anything. The older you get, the fewer opportunities you have for changing your life, for choosing alternate paths - even if you would never actually choose them. Sometimes I have a dream where something outlandish is happening, like I'm being courted by a prince, or I'm starring in a movie with my favorite actor, or I'm traveling the world on a whim, and then I realize, in the dream, that I'm 40 years old, I'm married and I have 5 kids and I can't possibly have the adventure I was about to have in the dream. Then I wake up. And there is always a little feeling of melancholy. I don't feel trapped or hard-pressed, just a bit sad for the death of possibility. Of course I will keep watching movies and reading books that put me in the middle of fantastic adventures and story lines, and I will enjoy them immensely. And although I will feel a little sad that I will never actually experience the reality of adventures like that, I will try to truly appreciate magic and beauty of the adventure I am living, the one that I chose.