Living Happily Ever After
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Blog Articles

College Application Day

Date: December 2, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

“Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school.” (Albert Einstein)

I remember that moment as if it were yesterday.

The moment my oldest entered the world and the doctor placed his squirming, naked body on my chest and I looked into his eyes for the very first time. I touched his head of blonde hair, talked to him and he instantly quieted and turned his head to look at me. As we looked into each others’ eyes, every dream I’d ever had seemed to come true in that moment.

Overall, he has been a dream, but like all children, occasionally there have been days filled with parenting challenges when the dream has been less than idyllic.

Like the first day of kindergarten when he came home  and announced he didn’t need to go back, he had learned everything he needed to know; he knew it all already.

Or when he was in first grade and struggled to settle down and complete his assignments which resulted in he and I sitting at the kitchen table for 6 hours on Saturdays, finishing everything he didn’t do during the week.

Or during every parent-teacher conference when each teacher expressed he never looked like he was paying attention, so they’d call on him and were surprised every time that he always knew the answer to the questions he was asked.

“I guess he was paying attention, even though he doesn’t look like it or  act like it,” they said.

My mom said, as she watched him live every day at full speed and sighed with exhaustion, “If you can just get him channeled in the right direction, he’ll be the best kid. Completely unstoppable. You’ll be in awe of him.”

Turns out, they were both right. His teachers and his Grandma Christensen. Because today, on his own, he kept track of the deadlines he needed to meet, he scheduled the required interviews, he submitted the paperwork necessary to continue to achieve his dreams; he applied for college. To BYU. He may not always look like he’s paying attention, but he is. And impressively so. Thankfully, he’s now channeling himself in the right directions and I just stand back in awe of who he is and what he accomplishes.

I couldn’t be more proud of my teenager who had his world shattered three weeks before his 16th birthday; who lost his life and everything he had ever known, including his father, and yet managed to maintain straight A’s while living through a nightmare. (What teenager does THAT?) Yet as I read over his college application, I couldn’t help but notice some changes from what I’d always anticipated to see on such paperwork.

I’d planned his life would be comprised of two married parents, tuition money taken care of, and time for lots of carefree fun. Instead, his application shows he lives with a single parent and three siblings, our income level was the second lowest category (the one above “O”), and that he needs scholarships, financial aid and a job to put himself through school. I also couldn’t help but think about all he does in addition to school: fills the father role for his younger brothers; drives children to daycare and school and other activities; helps discipline his brothers; teaches them to respect women, especially their mother; helps pay bills; maintains our vehicles and home; occasionally has to miss school to tend a sick child; works at Cold Stone and willingly turns every single paycheck over to me every pay day to help our family. Yet despite living the life of an adult/father figure, he manages to earn straight A’s, run a little track and play some ice hockey.

I look forward to watching him continue his education, in and out of the classroom. He has a lot to offer. I anticipate he’ll continue to learn new things, and most importantly, he’ll gain an education.

He’s hoping to do that at Brigham Young University. And if the acceptance committee is interested at all in diversity (there was a section on the application for information geared toward maintaining that) my son has a good chance of getting in as his life and experience certainly isn’t typical of many students preparing for BYU!

Now the wait for the acceptance letter is on.

After all, “Everything comes to those who wait… except a cat.” (Mario Andretti)

If Real Life Was Like The Movies

Date: September 29, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

“Hawaii is a unique state. It is a small state. It is a state that is by itself. It…is different from the other 49 states. Well, all states are different, but it’s got a particularly unique situation.” (Dan Quayle)

Still no ring, but we had survived our first “intense discussion.” And while the wait for the ring continued, Bachelor #5 helped take my mind off the wait. One day I got a very unexpected email, and invitation, from Bachelor #5: “Hey, I just had a crazy idea. What if you and I fly to Hawaii for a long weekend? Let me know what you think.”

Since 1993, in 17 years, I had left my children a total of 17 nights. The pre-unexpected life me would have declined that invitation without a second thought. But I was living an entirely different life, now, and the “new” me decided to at least entertain the idea. I just needed to see how my children felt about it. They were supportive, so I arranged for childcare, and one morning a few weeks later found myself on my way to Hawaii.

I never expected that.

We stayed with Bachelor #5′s best friends, a husband and wife he had known since college. (In fact, he introduced them to each other.) It was wonderful to meet them. As Bachelor #5 and I both had ties to Hawaii, it was also a great opportunity for us to see our old favorite places but make new memories with each other. The trip reinforced to me how many “near misses” we’d had; how close we’d been to meeting each other, but never actually met until my unexpected life began.

For example, while attending BYU-Hawaii, Bachelor #5 participated in a performing group. Imagine my surprise when we realized I’d gotten a piano scholarship from the group’s professor and director but I’d turned it down and attended college, instead, at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah.

Another example: My parents co-owned a home on Oahu’s Hukilau Beach when I was a girl. I spent time there boogie boarding every summer. I’d taken my children to that same beach for several years to share part of my childhood with them. And then I found myself sharing that same experience with Bachelor #5. While we were in the water looking toward the houses on shore, Bachelor #5 pointed out the house he’d lived in during his time in Hawaii–four houses down the beach from my parents’ house! I remembered college men had lived there (I’d seen them on the beach occasionally, I just never paid much attention to them because they were “older” than me.) I never realized that Bachelor #5 may have been one of them!

It reminded me of a movie I saw years ago starring Gwyneth Paltrow. Actually two movies in one, it showed one plot and story that took place as she made it onto a subway car before the door closed and a parallel version and story with different events, experiences and developments that took place when she missed the subway and the door closed before she could board. Interestingly, by the end of the movie, both stories took her to the same destination and life situation; both versions had the same ending, just chronicled different events that got her to the same point at the end.

While in Hawaii, I couldn’t help but compare that bit of Hollywood fiction to my reality.

“And if real life was like the movies, I should have lived happily ever after.” (Piper Laurie)

It was healing to realize, again, that sometimes we really do have to pass through indescribably difficult things to get to where we need to be; that all things truly can work together for our good IF we allow them to. And if we don’t quit too soon or give up (even when we’re overwhelmed with the path our journey has taken) we can trust that we’ll end up right where we have needed to be all along. Possibly even at the same “ending.” Our own “happily ever after.”

“Nothing is so awesomely unfamiliar as the familiar that discloses itself at the end of a journey.” (Cynthia Ozick)