cinderella dreams

We grew up believing in Cinderella, yet some of us feel as if our palace turned out to be a duplex, our prince turned out to be a frog, and the wicked stepmother turned out to be our mother-in-law.  Our fairy godmother apparently lost our addresses.  i attended sunday school this morning, which is a class taught by my good friend beth.  the class is titled Breaking Free by Beth Moore.  i can't say that i have followed the whole the course, as you learned from a previous post...i took a break.  the lesson today was about our (women's) dream relationship and that we can have that with Christ. 

so i sat through the class, i have to admit that my mind wasn't really on the class, i had tuned out. my physical presence was still there, seated to the right of beth in my plastic chair with the brown seat cushion.  my teal blue coffee mug sitting in front of me as well as my text book laid out on the plastic fold out table.  class was full today and there wasn't a ton of room on the table so my bible in it's lime green cover (a christmas present from beth a few years back) was propped on the floor next to my "mary poppins" handbag. my mind was thinking about my past, present and future cinderella dreams.

PAST
when i was little i wanted to meet my dream man, get married, have 2 kids and live happily ever after.  i never had an idea of whether i wanted to work or stay home, what this dream man would look like, where we would live, although i did want to live comfortably not paycheck to paycheck.  i met my ex in august after i graduated from high school, i was 18.  he is 5 years older than i am and i remember thinking he had experienced so much more than i had.  he lived outside of his parents house, had a steady job, had a dog and a cat and for some unknown reason he liked me, this goofy kid who didn't know anything about herself yet. 

we got married 6 years later.  looking back now i don't recall exactly how i felt towards him, i knew that i cared about him a great deal and i had already spent 6 whole years with him, but i knew he wasn't my dream man.  there were many things about him that i liked a lot, but several that drove me nuts.  it turns out the ones that drove me nuts would become much bigger in the years and ultimately drive us apart.  we were together a total of 15 years. 

from the outside my marriage looked like a cinderella dream. we lived in a gorgeous sprawling rambler that we built, our yard was well manicured, every flower came up where it was supposed to on strong sturdy stems, i stayed home and kept an impeccably clean home complete with fresh baked goods and dinner on the table, our children were well dressed (until they learned how to dress themselves) and i was always dressed to impress.  i wore a big smile and carried myself with a carefree attitude.  we appeared to be happy, in love, living the american dream.  it was a sham, sure the things we had were real, but i was missing something, i was miserable with my not so dreamy, dream man, i was craving attention, affection, passion, romance, understanding, appreciation, acceptance and most of all love.  i needed to be loved, feel loved and wanted from my prince charming, but he wasn't able to give me that.

PRESENT
i am now in that duplex mentioned above in the very first paragraph.  there are times when i am embarrassed that i live here, especially when people who knew where i used to live come here.  the gutters are falling off and there is a wonderful insulation layer growing on the outside of the roof, some call it moss.  the exterior is a few different paint colors and the plants are ridiculously overgrown and out of control.  that is just the exterior and like most things you shouldn't judge a book by it's cover, this is no exception.  with the help of my mom and the mammas, doc and ty, the inside of my castle is cute, clean and very livable, but it is missing something...a prince charming (i would never want to live in this castle with my prince charming).

throughout my time as a single gal, i have discovered something about the man i am naturally drawn to.  he is intense, driven, determined, proud of who he is and ultimately unavailable.  not in the sense that he is married and happily devoted to another woman, but in the sense that all the characteristics that are appealing and desirable to me are the exact same ones that make this type of man unavailable to a partner.  the things that he wants are just wants, there isn't a way for that man to achieve what he wants without losing the perception of who he thinks he is.  now i hate generalizations, but this has been my own personal experience with the intense, driven proud man.  i am sure that there are many, many of these men out there who know how to strike that balance of achieving it all.

my ex has always had good intentions, i knew what he wanted and how he envisioned our lives as we got older, but he was never able to execute that.  he wasn't ever able to meet my needs.  then there is J, he talked of a life that i have been searching for and really wanted to share with him, ultimately i wasn't the right girl for the job.  i am at peace with both of these prince charmings.  their inability to meet my needs isn't the end of my world, my dreams or desires, it just simply means that they aren't my prince charming.  i am ok with that.  i still think that both are good and respectable, intense driven proud men, but for some other cinderella.  a cinderella who isn't as needy. 

FUTURE
i guess i should first say that i try really hard to live in this day, this moment and make it the best i can.  there is that saying about not being able to predict the future or change the past all you have is today. i still dream of how i would like my cinderella dream to play out. i still want the same things i wanted as a little girl; dream man, kids, comfortable living, but i have added a few things.  my castle does not need to be big, having a big castle means you have to clean a big castle.  my castle won't come with a staff which means i have to clean it, so a moderately sized castle with a big kitchen.  my prince charming will undoubtedly have all the characteristics that i find desirable but he will also be a family man who knows how to treat his cinderella. as far as the wicked step mother, well i am not sure if there is a way around this, but i suppose i will find out someday.

fairy tales, romantic comedies, and some literature have skewed my ideas of how a relationship should look like.  i am hopeful that there is a prince charming out there for me.  i am pretty sure i won't hear fireworks the first time we kiss maybe a seagull squawking overhead will be my "fireworks".  his sturdy white steed will probably look more like a gas guzzling pick up truck (for some reason the men i am attracted to all drive trucks) in need of a wash.  i am sure he isn't going to come wandering into my garden (i don't have one) following the melody of my voice (i am a horrible singer he would probably run), it will go more like this, he will *wink* at me on one of those impersonal dating sights and i will email him back stating, "I hate the wink, if you have something to say to me just say it."  

yeah, it is a little different than the classic cinderella story, but i think my cinderella dream is attainable.