Goal Setting--Second Winning Blog Post

The blog’s contest--to write about a goal that you, someone close to you or your pet accomplished or failed to accomplish--ended in a tie. Last Friday’s blog post offered one of the two winning entries, One Old Goal, and today’s post features the second, by Josefina Wopatova.

My Goal

A teenage goal to star in a rock concert.
 (photo from multiple websites;
www.livescience.com, credits Maigi)

My teenage goal was to be a Rock Star. I wanted to be rich, famous and live a slightly dangerous life. That was the one of several goals I wasn’t ultimately destined to achieve. But, here’s the thing. Of those three components, the first two really didn’t speak to me. I learned that I don’t really crave the kind of attention that a “Star” would garner. I don’t even crave an excess of money. It rather seems wasteful to me. I eschew Hollywood mansions and suburban McMansions alike. I’d rather have old and character-driven people and things around me. I like quirky, and I like tarnished. So, maybe the real goal, unbeknownst to me at the time, was to find out who I was inside. I thought I wanted to be known to others, but really I wanted to know myself. I thought I wanted wealth, but perhaps inside what I really wanted was to be wealthy in love, friendship and family.

The third component of my teenage dream was to be controversial or take on some risks and dangers. I got closer to that goal than the others. Mostly, I tried out adventures that were slightly out of the norm: skydiving, alpine skiing, spontaneous and reckless travel (planes, trains and automobiles combined). Okay, that last one might just have been dumb and landed me in a couple of tight spots. This was the era before ATMs, cell phones or computers, and I’m amazed that I got from place to place without trouble. However, I did get to meet some semi-famous people along the way and learn more about human nature. The funny thing about talking with celebrities is how vulnerable they also are. John Madden (NFL Football) was afraid to fly (how silly! I thought), so I found him on the train. Sam Kinison (comedian) was insecure, shy and soft spoken, completely unlike his on-stage character. Lawrence Taylor (NY Giants) was kind, quiet and generous to young me, the cocktail waitress, belying his hulky appearance. 

My adventures weren’t beyond the pale, but felt way outside of my Midwestern, small town life experience: I ate lamb’s brain in France and tamales in Mexico; I flew loop-the-loops in an airplane over Huntington Beach, Calif., and hiked up the Matterhorn in Switzerland. I camped in Roma on one of the seven hills. I drank too much Ouzo in Athens with other globetrotting young people. I laughed at the “bathrooms” in Italy, where at the time and place, it was simply a hole in the ground that you hovered over.

Tarantula crossing sign, though
in California and not a highway.
(photo from justalittlefurther.com)

I stepped over rattlesnakes and played with tarantulas crossing the highway in Arizona. Did you know that there are spider-crossing signs there, just like we see deer crossing signs in the northern climes? Weird.

So while my life goal wasn’t achieved, per se, one of the components of it was--enough to satisfy me at least. I wouldn’t change a thing.

Oh, and I sing like a Rock Star. Especially in the shower.