Blog Topic #5: Who Found You?

While this really has nothing to do with real estate, I felt it fit with the topic.  So here goes.

When I was in the 4th grade, we moved from Maryland to Virginia.  At the time, it was quite traumatic because it was the only place I could really remember living.  But my father had made the decision and there was no stopping him once his mind was made up.

We joined a new church, which I didn't really like but I did make some very nice friends.  One of these friends was a girl named Michelle (just like me!).  In the middle of 8th grade, I got kicked out of the church school.  Long story!  Suffice to say, it wasn't a pretty incident; and I felt as though I'd again been ripped apart from the few friends that I chose to keep.

Fast forward from 1980 to 2006...

Every once in a while, I get an email from someone on Classmates.com. It's always interesting to see where your old friends are in their lives and where they've been. On January 7, 2006, I received a message from someone with whom I've not spoken since about the middle of 8th grade. That would put our last conversation around the end of 1980 sometime. She told me all about her life since we split up. She told me about her marriages, divorces and children. Both of our respective sets of parents are divorced and remarried. And we both have had some harrowing experiences.

Then it dawned on me. We both consider ourselves survivors. We are survivors from a horrible church background that has marred our very thinking about life in general. We are survivors of abuse from various people in our lives. Survivors of our own lives! Then she brought up an interesting thought - did our childhood church experience (one church in particular) cause us to be cursed in some way because we chose paths that were different than what was prescribed by this church?  To someone outside of our circle, this may sound like an odd question; but to us, it makes perfect sense.

Many others that we knew, went to school with, went to church with, have ended up in jail, on drugs, been married multiple times, etc. So I have to ask myself one simple question: Had we chosen to stay with this church and its people, would our lives have been any different? Any better? Any worse?

I decided it was time to do some life inventory. Where have I been? What have I done? Where am I going? Do I have any plans for the future? Do I even have a future anymore?

So that's where I am... doing an inventory of my life and hoping I don't come up empty-handed in the end.  Thanks, Michelle, for giving me the courage to wake up and see that my life isn't nearly as bad as I had originally thought!