So, 3 years ago, I read a really interesting book by Anita Shreve called Resistance. It was about resisting the Nazis back during WWII in Europe. I was so interested that I embarked on a reading frezy to determine what I would have done, depending on who I was during that time, with regards to the political forces at the time. I have read over 300 books on WWII alone since then.
About 3 months after I first read her book, I found myself in the hospital with sepsis, not too pleasant, and cable for the first time in about a year. Big mistake, I was supposed to be sleeping and just resting but between family phone calls and 30 Minute Meals with Rachael Ray, I just wasn't taking any naps. Flipping around one night, I turned to the History Channel, also another favorite. On it was an HBO series called Band of Brothers based on the book by Stephen Ambrose. I had read the book earlier in the year, but there were quite a few characters and it was sometimes hard to follow. I couldn't stop watching the show and was very sad when I was discharged and went back home to no-cable land.
But, thanks to our fabulous library system, I was able to borrow the whole series. It did violate my rated-R rule, although, not technically because there was no rating, but it was well worth it. It is an amazing series and I highly recommend it.
This all brings me to what I want to do when my girls are done needing me. I want to be a history professor, one who teaches upper division. In college, all of my elective credits went to upper division history classes. I should have seen if I had a minor, I am sure I did. I don't want to teach things like World Civ, where I would be just lecturing to a bunch of bored freshman, I want to teach to people who actually want to be there and want to discuss things with me. I have always loved history, but my interest in WWII totally clinched it for me. I was just lucky that it was 2004 that I got the bug because it was the 60th anniversary of the Allied landings at Normandy and even with the few channels we did get, it was documentaries and personal accounts galore!
So, are you doing what you wanted to when you grew up? I did want to be a mom, but I also wanted to be a Supreme Court Justice (without being a sleazy lawyer first, heehhee, that's just what I thought) I also wanted to be a pediatrician, and for a while I was going to be a nurse on my way to being a doctor. If you aren't, what did you want to be and what are you doing now? Hopefully, twenty years from now, I will be a doctor, just of the Phd variety and teaching European history to a bunch of interested youngsters. (They will be youngsters to me by the time I get there!)
2 comments:
Great topic! I'm glad someone likes history because I sure don't. Maybe if I had a really good professor, such as yourself, I would feel differently about the subject. That was certainly the case for other subjects in college.
When I was young, I wanted to be the first female President of the United States. And if not that, then a lawyer. (But not a seedy one.) I was voted "Most Likely to be the First Woman President of the United States" in elementary school (that might have had something to do with my first goal.) And I was voted "Most Likely to Succeed" in High School. How's that for pressure. Well, I turned out to be just a plain old business woman.
I'm not sure anyone dreams of being a Strategic Planner when they're little. Heck, I'm still not sure what it is. But I am blessed with interesting work for a terrific company which allows my husband to be a stay-at-home dad. (Something which we look forward to doing again someday.) So I suppose I've ended up with more than I could have dreamed when I was little. A life, not just a career.
I always knew I'd be a mom, but like Lori, had dreams of being President! Also Miss America. And a lawyer, a doctor, an engineer, let's see, what else?
I still have this conversation with myself, about what the next phase of my life will be about. I've recently been doing a little research on actuaries, which would require me to remember everything I learned in my math major and then some. I've thought of teaching. I don't think I have the patience to do a PhD. Maybe law school though. Can you tell that at 32, I still have no idea?
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