Today I enter my 41st year on this earth.

At 7:41am central time on September 25, 1965 I made my grand entrance into this world. My dad was in Vietnam. My oldest sister was off at college. And my mom had been in the hospital for several days, since I had threatened to come during Wednesday night Bible study (my mom, Chaplain’s wife to the core, refused to leave until Bible study was over), but changed my mind shortly thereafter.

That’s a pattern I continued all through my life, changing my mind. Frequently and often. Though not many people really know that. I tend to think a lot before I speak, which generally helps. Though it has been my downfall from time-to-time. But I digress.

It’s kinda funny, really. I used to look at the "40s" as being old. But I don’t feel old. I still feel like a freshman in high school, all geeky and goofy-looking but like I’ve got the world by the… well… and my whole life is in front of me.

I still feel that way. Well, except for the last part. I don’t feel like I’ve got my "whole" life in front of me anymore. I feel like it’s mostly behind me. Whether that’s really true or not is yet to be determined.

Ah, the dreams I had of where I would be, who I would be, by the time I was in my 40s. And how far I am from any of them! In my early 30s I was convinced that by the time I was 41 I would be married, with at least one or two children. I’d be living in LA, a stay-at-home mom with a big house and a dog or two. My husband would be a doctor, or a writer-producer (told you I changed my mind often). By the time I reached my late thirties, I was thinking more of marrying another missionary, or someone in ministry somewhere. But the kids thing was still very much in the dream.

In my late 20s I definitely saw myself as married long before I turned 40, with a husband/writing partner on a successful television show — and three or four kids running around too.

In my late teens early 20s I couldn’t even conceive of my 40s — but I know the dream was to be married with six kids, and several Grammys, Oscars and Tonys decorating my mantles around my huge home in Malibu. I still believed I could be Olivia Newton-John, Patti LuPone and Debbie Reynolds all rolled into one.

My, how different my life turned out. Not that I’m complaining. Those were nice dreams. But that’s all they were. Dreams. Fantasies. Real Life is so much different. And, for the most part, so much better.

41. No kids. No husband. No boyfriend. No big house. No shiny awards. I’m not even working in entertainment anymore (unless this blog counts as "entertainment"; if so, I’m grossly underpaid and need to unionize NOW).

I’m extremely grateful to God for unrealized dreams. Not that kids and husbands and big houses and awards aren’t great to have (or want). It’s just that I look around at my life and I’m satisfied. I like where I am at this moment. I don’t want to stay here forever, but I like it for right now. I’m grateful I don’t have children. More for them than for me. I look at who I was back then, even just two or three years ago, and I know I would have inflicted much pain and brokenness on their young hearts and minds. Not that I won’t still should God create a new miracle and give me a child in my "old age". But I’ve learned so much about who am really am, in God’s eyes, and what really matters, that I think the damage I’ll inflict will be much, much less than it would have been had I had those six children in my 20s that I dreamed of and so longed for.

And while having a husband, a partner, to share my life with would truly be a blessing, I’m so grateful he’s not in my life yet. I couldn’t be the wife and partner and lover he deserves, not then, and perhaps not even yet. I’m still dealing with some stuff that needs to be resolved, needs healing, before I’ll be there.

And truthfully, I really love being single. I couldn’t always say that. I don’t know that I could ever really say that and have it be the truth. I know I wanted to believe I was happy being single, but the truth is that I spent most of my adult years dreaming and fantasizing of my "knight in shining armor," rather than living the life in front of me. I didn’t really give myself the chance to be single, in body, spirit and mind because my mind and spirit were always elsewhere, pining to be married.

(Boy does my grammar suck in this post — I just started two paragraphs with "And" and I have no desire, or ideas how, to change it. I’m either getting old in my head too, or getting more rebellious — yeah, probably both.)

While I miss my friends in Hollywood, and I miss working on the Paramount lot especially, I don’t miss the constant popularity contest of that world. I don’t miss feeling like I was perpetually back in high school and was once again not in the in crowd, but desperately wanting to be. The corporate world of health care (is there another industry in which to work in Nashville, besides music??) is just as filled with politics — which, if Friday is any indication, I’m completely failing at still; but that’s another story — but it isn’t as high school-ish as Hollywood is. And the politics are easier to ignore, because, unlike television, sometimes what we are dealing with really is life-and-death-brain-surgery stuff.

I’m so grateful I didn’t realize those dreams of success in the Industry, of Grammys and Oscars and Tonys. Can you imagine? None of that success, none of those awards would have made a difference in who I really am, down inside, and how broken I was and still am. It just would have made it that much harder to admit my brokenness and need for redemption and transformation at the deep level God has provided.

Had all those dreams been realized, I would not be able to live the life I have now. No, it’s not a perfect life. I will probably spend my birthday evening alone (plans fell through late last night) catching up on my TiVo’s activities after a day filled with budget frustrations and constantly changing numbers at work. My dreams for a hybrid car and a couple acres of land to call my own still elude me. My longing for a life partner is still unmet. My Weight Watchers plans all went to crap this week and the only present I’ll probably get today will be the iPod I’m planning to buy myself after work tonight.

But you know what? I still have an awesome life. I have this wonderful little place that is all my own. A place where I feel safe, not just physically but emotionally. I didn’t realize that I’d never really felt that before; not until recently. I’m a safe person for me to be alone with — I’ve never been that before. Too much self-beating and emotional self-abuse.

I have a wonderful little car, a complete gift from God! I have family and friends who love me (even though most are a couple thousand miles away), a God who adores me and a few dear friends who truly believe in me.

Most of all, I’m finally discovering who I really am. For the first time I’m finally truly delving into all the parts of me I so carefully avoided for fear of offending someone I loved and losing their love and I’m staring it all down, studying me from every angle and learning who and what I am, from the inside out. Perhaps that’s really my birthday gift this year: Me.