Is this how I pictured my life?

A load of laundry rested on one hip while a younger Shane rested on the other. I was returning from hanging laundry. Climbing down the stairs, a grin stole onto my sun burnt face. I remember the moment very clearly because in a split-second I saw myself in a snap-shot. Married lady hanging laundry with child on hip. I just had to grin! Is this how I planned my life? Ten years ago did I picture myself doing the housewife/mommy thing, doing the daily chores of housework, feeding babies and a husband? I, of all people, did not plan it this way.

I didn't plan it this way because on my terms I would have been married those ten years ago. While I didn't grow up to "only" want marriage and babies, at the very same time I figured it would just happen. Eventually. You know, like around my early 20's. Like my mom for instance. She married my dad, her high-school sweetheart on the day of his graduation from medical school. She was only a kid at 21 years old. Although I never felt pressure to marry any of my high school boyfriends, in hind-sight I did expect things to "fall into place" early. Earlier that is, than my late 20's, that's for sure.

But that's exactly what didn't happened. Time kept getting past me. I did the college thing where you're supposed to find Mr. Right. There, I found a Mr. Possibility but in quiet moments of reflection, I couldn't tune-out the unsettling in my heart. Six months after graduation, I headed to Kolkata, India without attachments to much of anything but a teeny kitten my mom had adopted. Focused, driven, and totally submerged in my new world of street kids, drug addicts, slum dwellers and abused women (all of whom became and still are my dearest friends) it was Mother Teresa's beautiful city that captured my heart.

Yet I was still restless for love. It's always there, isn't it? I turned 25 years old in India. I remember a surprise party and getting my nose pierced for $5. I'm certain I wondered back then when my turn would come for love. By 25 years old my mom was on her second child and mastering homemade bread while I, at 25, was on my second world-tour and mastering street food and intestinal parasites.

Love did happen eventually only it wasn't on my terms of when, how, and where. It happened much later in life than I had "just supposed" it would. The landmark moments of life didn't make Mr. Right magically appear after all. I returned from India and my friend Ben left for his own stint in India. Time kept ticking.....we mailed letters and sent packaged.

But Love finally knocked all those years later and I was faced with this choice: Love this man Ben, or miss out in life. I chose Love. I'm so glad I did.

And I'm so glad to be in this "other story," the one I didn't picture. I walked down the isle eight years later than I was "supposed" to. We began our family when I was 31 years old, while many of my peers are enrolling their children in 1st grade. Here I am today in a life unpictured and unplanned. By me. Yet....while my life didn't happened on my terms and timeline, it is a life where dreams come true. It's so so good to be here, with laundry on one hip and a baby on the other.

Just like it was always supposed to be.