One more excerpt from a sister - mary conversation this weekend.
Mary: so, Elizabeth, if you could do ANYTHING, what would it be? I mean...if it didn't matter about money, kids, all of that...everything would be taken care of...
Elizabeth: Mary, I have a child and a husband now...that is who I am...I can't just do whatever I want to do...
Mary: I realize this. I am not proposing that you kill your child, divorce your husband, have a sex change and flee the country...I was asking you to IMAGINE...just use your IMAGINATION...if you could do anything, what would your dream job be?
Elizabeth: Look, Mary, I'm sorry, I don't have some kind of ROMANTIC answer about what I'm PASSIONATE about... (note the condescending tone)
Mary: never mind then.
This, my dear readers, is indicative of the great divide between myself and my family. Passion, love, and an absolute devotion to what I do is what motivates me to get up in the morning and stay up all night to finish a project. There is nothing else I could do or would want to do. I have never been one to be able to sit with a sense of mediocrity...If there is something out there for me...that is exactly who I am and what I want to do, I am going to find a way to get it. Passing time, wasting time on things that don't really fit...is not for me...even if it means I sacrifice "security," approval, understanding and assurance, nothing is worth the cost of self-sacrifice.
In some ways it is sad that my family and I will never see things eye-to-eye, but that we have managed to figure out a way to navigate the troubled waters of our relationships and (most of the time) respect one another is a fairly amazing thing.
5 comments:
i think some people just aren't built to be able to imagine more. they wouldn't know what to do with that kind of freedom. i think its cool when people can live and die that ignorant. and i'm not kidding when i say that. the worst thing is when some people get to be in their 50's or 60's or older and then they begin regretting. i set out in my life to never at the end of my time on earth have to question "what if?" but houses and cars and families are nice, too.
Maybe your sister is so envious of your passion that she has to completely denounce the mere idea of it. She needs to dismiss it.l
t: were you finished with your sentences?
I use the letter 'l' for emphasis.
oh, okay because that makes perfect sense. is that something you teach in your writing class?
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