A good portion of the time was spent talking about my sisters relationship with her boyfriend. She is 22, he is 24. My sister has been through a lot over the years and is much more mature than her 22 years, she is ready for life. Wants to have experiences, grow as a person. Where her partner is fine being 24. Which in itself isn't a big deal just within the context of their relationship they are on different paths. It made me think a lot about when I was 22, newly moved to Seattle. I fell in love with the absolutely most wrong person for me, I even knew it at the time but I figured, as well all do when we are young, that I could mold myself into the person he wanted me to be and then everything would be great. It was the great heartbreak of my life, my first real true love... it was devastating and led to a lot of bad decisions. But good did come from it.
I moved from Seattle to Phoenix, and after many long conversations with my mom about how searching for love was a waste of time and that true love would find you when you least expected it. I spent the next year not dating. During that year I got to know myself, who was I really? What did I want in life? During that time I came up with a list of what I call the "Non Negotiables" The things that I wanted in a partner that weren't open to compromise. If you had 4 of the 5 things on my list, you didn't make the cut. While that might seem superficial, it was about who the person was. My Non Negotiables?
Integrity
Intelligence
Humor
Adventurous
Loving
Not all that complicated, but you would be surprised. When I met my husband, he was already on my radar as we had already met many years earlier through a work function when I lived in Seattle. I knew him to be kind and considerate, smart and funny. He was unlike anyone I had ever dated, yet I felt so drawn to him that it was like the universe just knew. We dated, we married, we had 3 kidlets... almost 17 years later I still get butterflys when he kisses me.
Too many times we doubt ourselves, our abilities to make the right choices. Life is a series of choices, one leads to another, to another. There are never NO choices, not making a choice is still a choice. So as I listened to my sister talk about her relationship and her life, I realized that I am so happy to be where I am today. As my mom would say, a Beautiful Smart In Control Woman :)
not to shabby for 44 :)
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