It’s funny how time and space can blend when you spend so much time in the same environment. It feels like suddenly 20 years has passed, and here you are thinking, where did time go?
I was taking a morning walk through my neighborhood recently and thinking about how many years I had lived in this area and have walked this same neighborhood. To my estimation, I had been walking this same exact path, through these exact same streets, for 20 years.
20 years of my life.
I had raised three children walking these streets through each stage of their lives…with skateboards being kicked near my ankles, basketballs being bounced all over the place and walking for what felt like hundreds of miles hunched over, chasing toddlers…sometimes all this going on at the same time.
And I thought this is where it all began.
On this day, as I was walking by this particular house, I was brought back to a time way, long ago that I had completely forgotten about. Maybe it was just the way the light was shining on the front door of the house, but I was transported to a much simpler time, in the same place.
I was walking with my little brother. It was a summer day and we were out “exploring." Must’ve been little kid, city-speak for taking a walk to a small child. But that’s what we were doing…exploring. I think we were around 10 or 11 years old. My adult thoughts immediately thought what the hell were we doing wandering so far from home unattended? But again, much simpler time. (sometimes I hate that I’m old enough to say this and remember a simpler time, and other times I’m grateful for such memories)
But I remember distinctly how warm the air was, and how it felt to be free…. a happy, kind of kid joy…the joy of freedom…or perhaps escaping…lol…. but none the less, here we were walking down, what in my young mind saw as a grand, posh neighborhood. It was like we were walking where we were not supposed to be and at the same time, it was unimaginable that people lived this way. I thought the homes were stately, the lawns perfectly manicured and everything was neat, orderly and bright.
Our lives were vastly different than theirs, since we had only lived in apartments and were currently living in an apartment building at the time, so to see the vast difference through our little kid eyes, left us wide-eyed and dreaming.
As we walked down the middle of the street, we looked from side to side and were pointing and saying, “oh, look at this one” and “I like this one” and then I saw it.
I looked over at this house and I said, “this one is mine, that’s my door.” Perhaps it was the double doors, or the bold statement of how big those doors looked to me at that time, but for whatever reason, that was the one.
As I passed by the house again, on this day, as I had done so many times, I could hear the echoes of our little voices from 35 years ago. And it occurred to me that I had made it. I had made it into this neighborhood and have been roaming around here for 20 years, now with my babies who are almost all grown and here I am, with myself, once again.
I began to think about dreams. And how things can come full circle. And how sometimes on the journey we forget to dream or how sometimes we forget to see that dreams have been realized when we are in the grind. The first house I bought was in this exact neighborhood and I went on to buy two more.
I share all of this with you to say…
Don’t forget the dreams from long ago that were there before the grind. Maybe it’s not the dream of big fancy doors, for you, maybe it’s something else; better yet, maybe it’s more important to take the time to appreciate where you’ve been and far you’ve come…we forget to remember these things, time is funny that way.
Feel some gratitude for what you’ve built and created in your life, and dare to dream for more, because these days right here, right now, may just be the days where you’ll look back and remember when you dared to dream so big.