Things About Wannabes

We're all wannabes. 

I was told a long time ago that I was a wannabe. I was told again and again by insecure men and women. The ones who were wannabes themselves. Wannabe religious icons. Wannabe conduits of the Holy Spirit. Wannabe idols. Wannabe controllers. They told me how I was a wannabe wife. A wannabe mother. A wannabe Christian and firefighter and EMT and everything else I’d ever imagine being. They kept me in submission with the constant reminder that I’d never quite arrive. 

It took me years to realize that none of us ever will. 

You show me somebody who’s the shining star of confidence in his chosen field and I’ll show you somebody who’s lying awake at night wondering if anybody else noticed the glaring flaws that are keeping him up all night. Dollars to donuts even Donald Trump returned from Helsinki wondering if the whole world was actually right, and how he can convince them otherwise, even if he secretly agrees that he fucked up. 

It’s the over-confident ones that are the most wannabe of all. The ones who really have something to prove. The blow-hard name droppers who can’t let their actions speak for themselves. The ones who claim to have God’s own corner on truth. Those are the real wannabes. 

Either that or they’re just straight narcissists. But that’s a whole different blog post. 

It’s the perfect wife and mother who struggles the most with her inadequacy. It’s the most successful businessman who can never make the ultimate power play. It’s the most pious priest who hides the most depravity. 

We’re all wannabes. From Donald Trump to Mother Theresa. We all know there’s a next level that we haven’t hit. But the ones with the most power are the ones with the humility to own it. To wear it proudly like a key to adventure slung heavily around our necks. When there’s always something to learn, there’s always somewhere to go, and life is movement. Life is nothing without growth and exploration to see whats around the corners we haven’t turned yet. 

Hell yeah, I’m a wannabe. And it’s wanting to be that has led me through a thousand new doorways into places I never would’ve imagined. I’m happy to have arrived on the neverending path of curiosity and unfinished business. 

I have definitely arrived when it comes to beer. Beer level = EXPERT.

Things About Getting Cocky

I get that I've been bragging a lot. I mean, the tropical wonderland of Brazil, all this blather about contentedness... I've kind of been rubbing it in your face, right? Well pride goeth before every good fall, doesn't it?

It's just that the minute you start feeling good about yourself, something is bound to go wrong. At least in my life that seems to prove true over and over again. Not that wrong is always bad. In fact usually it's pretty hilarious. Later on. But I have been getting way too cocky and it's catching up with me. Like when you finally get a few minutes of success on your toe edge when you're out snowboarding and suddenly you think you're cool enough to rock acid washed jeggings. And then the $500 latch that you had replaced on your stupid car breaks AGAIN, only this time in the UNLATCHED position, and the back door flops open every time you hit a bump, flashing the dome lights in your rig all the way home like a mobile rave.

Or like when you think you're tough enough to do hard core yoga two days in a row AND go snowboarding and slam your less-than petite frame on the ice several hundred times and then you wake up feeling like something chained down to a steel table in Dr. Frankensteins laboratory. Except you're not chained down and you have to actually get up and do stuff. Like work. And sitting on really uncomfortable bleachers for a lot of hours.

I really need to quit bragging, and getting all comfortable with myself. Because it doesn't change the fact that things break, technology freezes and catastrophes prevail as soon as I walk into the room and there will always be a trail of disaster following me for all of us to laugh at. And if we don't all laugh at the trail of disaster following me then I will surely need to be committed to an insane asylum where I can quit disastering and just cuddle with a padded wall all day long.

The minute I start to think that I actually have my shit together somebody is gonna faithfully remind me that my writing is schmaltzy, I still make minimum wage in most of my jobs and my driving habits may or may not be legal. But while we're laughing about the bungee cords holding the rear door of my ridiculously overpriced luxury SUV closed, can we also take a moment to remember all the cool stuff that I've done? Like Brazil, and getting on my toe edge. And TOTALLY rocking jeggings. ( <---- ok so really I slinked from shadow to shadow to avoid being caught in public, but I did wear them out of the house.)