Observations on destiny

So I have officially become obsessed with Christina Coppa's blog, Storked!, on glamour.com. Coppa is a single mom to a one year old son, and the things she writes about her life, her child, they are the words in my heart, in my soul. She just got a book deal...lucky bitch. She is inspiring me to go there again, to find the words and write them down and send them out into the world, for all to read and know. Writing is where I truly find myself, and I have wandered so far off the path, but the rigors of this life just haven't given me time to go there, to get back to where I want and need to be. Coppa's blog talks about how she chose her life, she knew she was going to do it alone, and that it would be hard, but that she wouldn't trade it for anything. I feel that. So completely.
From the moment I found out I was pregnant, I think, in a lot of ways I was unwilling to admit at the time and for a long time afterward, I knew I would be right where I am today, raising Kayla on my own. Yes, AJ and I share custody, yes she loves her daddy, yes I get child support, yes I have it better than 90% of single moms in that respect, but at the end of the day, every week day I am alone raising her. I have my family always willing to help in whatever way they can, but my own pride and need to accept responsibility for the life I created doesn't often allow me to take advantage of that. But, in the end, and in the beginning, its me and Kayla. Love it or hate it, I am the one who is the fixer of the boo boos, the lay-er down of the law, the calm in the storm, the voice of reason. Yes, when I found out I was pregnant, this is the life I knew I would have. Don't get me wrong, I wanted the two parent family, the textbook definition of a "perfect" life, with the three of us around the dinner table sharing our days, Kayla's toys and clothes and other accessories of life strewn from one end of the house to other, hell even another baby by now.
Do I think we could have been happy? Yes, or if not, we could have put on the facade of happy. Do I think we are all better off now? Yes. Kayla has two parents that are over the moon for her, are friends to each other, co-parents in the truest sense, and two bedrooms- one Elmo, one Cinderella, one backyard with a jungle gym, one with a plastic house and a slide. More clothes and books and toys than any child should ever have. She can spell her name. She can recite her ABC's, her numbers to ten in English and Spanish, knows her colors and her shapes. By all accounts, we are doing something right. Her three years of life have been pretty happy, despite the ugliness of the first months of AJ's and I's break-up, and my overwhelming sadness and sense of failure. Would they have been as happy if we were still together? Maybe...probably. But would her parents have been? Probably not. And that would have made her much unhappier, much more stressed in the long run. That would never have been fair to her. Not for one minute.
Honestly, when the judge told me that I would have to allow AJ overnight visitation, I felt like I was being punished, like the entire world was going to stop twirling on its axis. There was nothing worse than taking my baby away from me, even for one night. The first night he took her I cried myself to sleep. I had to create a ritual just to keep my mind occupied and off her. Flash forward three years and some weeks I am counting down the days to the weekend because I need a fucking break. I love my girl, she is my whole heart, the very best thing I have ever done, but she is tiring! She's like me when I was that age, non-stop chatter and motion and need. I love her more than I could ever articulate, but mama needs a break! I need room to breathe and feel 26 years old for 10 minutes. Yes, I miss her when she is gone, yes I feel like I have lost a limb, but I am so grateful now that I worked hard to maintain her relationship with her father. And yes, I know I am lucky, and I tip my hat to all the single moms who don't have the option of carting their child off for the weekend. I don't know how you do it!
Coppa talks in one of her blogs about her life happening while she was busying mapping out her plans. She also says the goals she set for herself were achieved, just in different order than she planned, and the order life decided made her a stronger person. I understand that completely. When I was a little girl, I had a fantasy journal (yes, nerd and aspiring writer right here!) and I would write about my life, my dreams, relationships I hoped to have and the ways in which they were to be conducted. Meet a random guy after too many shots in a bar, fall feet over head, be silly and crazy and not cautious, not call my gyn to make sure the med the ER prescribed didn't indeed render my pill virtually ineffective, get pregnant, have mom get sick, turn myself inside out, sideways, upside down, backwards, every which way to make it work with someone who wasn't ready for it, have my mom die before seeing her first grandchild, blow up like a balloon because my kidneys stopped working, have a preemie, having Dan die, becoming a single mom...yeah none of that was in my cards. I was going to go to college, finish with my Journalism degree, meet a guy while I was there, get married out of school, have some babies, live in a house by the ocean, and be in total bliss for life. I realize that is a crock of shit, and the person I am now would never be satisfied with a middle school girl's ideals for her life. I also think in that same journal I noted that I would never have sex with a guy unless I had been in a serious relationship with him for two years...for anyone that knows me, that is so beyond laughable I can't even comment. But that just further proves the point of how unrealistic the goals I set for myself were. I met a guy my freshman year of college. I liked him, there was an instant connection, and I had my timeline, so of course I had to pursue, time was a-wasting. I dropped the L-bomb, and he hightailed it out of my life. I can understand it, I was too intense. I was trying to create a life I obviously wasn't meant to live. If I had meant to do any of the things I had created for myself over 10 years ago in my journal, I would be doing them. Plain and simple.
As life would have it, I was meant to take a break from school to try and find the person that had become jumbled up in a mass of college living-too much freedom, alcohol, random boys and not much studying or caring. Instead of finding the me I thought I was, I found a new (and hopefully improved version to those that knew me back in the day) me. I had to stumble along the way, into a seedy bar every night, partying till 4 AM only to head to work at 7 AM, I had to get involved with inappropriate people and hurt my mother (still one of my deepest regrets.) I had to be young and free and in my 20's. Then, like a bomb, my world exploded. I was 22 and in crazy and drama filled love, with the best friends and very little debt, a job I loved and then I was pregnant. BOOM- in one instant, a life I had thought was pretty damn fun and heading in a good direction was over. And life moved in another direction faster than I could keep up.
Kayla was here in short order. Mom was gone. I had to adapt, and survive. And you know what, its what I was meant for. Miss Kayla, with her eyes and her small hands that fit so perfectly in mine, and her questions that just floor me, and her smell and her voice, and her perfection-her- its what was intended for me. No question in my mind, not for one moment. She has been my destiny since before I ever imagined her into existence. She is the reason for me. And in the mornings, when we are bundled into the car, and she requests her new obsession, Natasha Bedingfield's "Pocketful of Sunshine," or her "sunshine song" as she calls it, I know me and her alone is the will of whatever higher power there is. I do resent it sometimes, like the other morning when Kayla wanted a donut and I had to count change to get her one, because frankly, paychecks aren't stretching nearly far enough, but for better or for worse, its me and her. And if its that way forever, thats fine. And if its not, thats fine too. We Hewlitt women, we roll with the punches. We adapt. We don't give up when things look dismal. If there is one thing that Kayla's conception, pregnancy, birth and life has taught me so far, besides the fact that I am stronger than I realize most days, is that its that we don't always have control over what life wants for us. And that's okay by me. Because everyday with my baby girl is an adventure, and I can't wait to see where we end up, 6 months from now, a year from now, 5 years from now.
So have I accomplished my timeline? I haven't finished my degree...trying my damndest to get back into it...no husband, or boyfriend, to even speak of...I have my own house and my own car...we're close to the ocean...but I have Kayla, and that cancels out any other goal I have yet to achieve. I am raising a person. I am responsible for someone else. I am needed and loved just because. Thats powerful stuff. So I say, screw the timeline. Live the life you are intended to live. And enjoy the ride.