Questions

It feels slightly strange that this new chapter in my life (the new version of me that is much stronger) also aligns with other huge milestones: college and getting married. I became a lot more independent in college and much, much stronger while planning my wedding. Throughout these milestones, I have been asked many questions about how life is going and what the next steps are. 

The first time it really is thrown in your face is when you graduate high school and people ask what you're going to major in. This didn't happen much for me as I was already doing college in high school and summer college classes before my on-campus classes began in the fall. People would just ask what classes I was taking, and I'd tell them the names of classes and very vaguely explain them if they asked, although the titles were typically self-explanatory. 

Near the end of my senior year of college, I was asked a lot about what was next afterward. I didn't know. I was so focused on finishing up my classes that I didn't really think to have a job set up for when I graduated. I ended up finding a random job but quit six months later, learning the hard lesson to never quit a job without a new one lined up unless it's like an emergency. 

Then I was constantly asked about how the job hunt was going. This was when the questioning became heavy on my shoulders. I felt the guilt every time when I didn't have an interview coming up. This was a year-long "gap year" between jobs, as I like to call it. I ended up questioning my worth and my skills. I did end up getting a job within my field and doing things I enjoy, and it's where I'm at now. 

Then, a few months later, I got engaged. Oh boy, did everyone love asking questions (and the same ones, too). Thankfully, people weren't asking when we'd get engaged/married while dating, because that would have been met with feelings for me of "It's none of your business?" I didn't mind explaining things to my mom at all or other people I was close with, it was more of a conversation than a questionnaire. One of the worst questions I was ever asked while engaged was, "What are your decorations like?" Now, this wouldn't have been a bad question if I had been "allowed" to answer how I wanted to. I vaguely explained a few things and the vision, but that wasn't good enough for some reason and felt like an interrogation, as they wanted exact details which would be a lot to try to get them to understand for an entire wedding. So, my now-husband went into extreme depth with photos from my Amazon cart (which obviously wasn't making sense in this person's mind, and I knew this would happen), and it was kind of a mess that he and I laughed about later because of how much of a disaster it was. That was the only time we ever went into detail with someone who wasn't involved with the wedding. We didn't really mind answering the same general wedding questions from people, as we never remembered how much we had updated with each person. We planned essentially the entire wedding by ourselves, so it made sense why we were getting these questions. It was the first time that people we asking questions left and right, so it was a lot to take in, but it was fun most of the time! 

Then he was in an accident (which he walked away from totally fine). Every single person asked him about this, which I typically had to listen to. I would just chime in at some point with how it wasn't a fun phone call to receive. I noticed how each time he'd tell the story, he would slightly simplify it. It wasn't fair for me to be annoyed by the details simply because I had heard the story a bunch of times but I think it did help me to become desensitized to hearing about such a scary event (but, of course, he mentioned at our wedding that even this accident couldn't keep us from getting married, which made me want to cry). He was also very tired of re-telling this story to every person who asked after the first five times. So, I suggested he tried simplifying it when he told the story (everyone close to us had already heard the detailed version), so he tried that, and it literally saved between 5-10 minutes of storytelling, which he was very happy about. 

Then we got married. I was constantly asked how the wedding was (perfect), how the honeymoon was (perfect), and how married life was (great, just had to get used to sleeping with another person in the room, and not letting him steal the covers!). Two months after that, we got a dog, and people would ask about her, and all I really had to do was show them a picture, tell them her name, and what kind of dog she was. So, we would update about what we were currently training her on and what training we had successfully completed.

And here we are today. What do I get asked about now? Married life (sometimes), our home (sometimes), our jobs, our dog. While it's fun to go through milestones, it's kind of nice to not have something to explain over and over, especially to people I'm not close with, and you want to make sure you give them enough information but don't feel like going into extreme detail (as that's not what 99% of people actually want). So I try to keep these things in mind when I have people I know getting married or are in college. I've gone through some great milestones in life, and I'm happy to just be me, and not feel like I have this sign above my head that says, "Ask me about my current event/milestone!" 

It's really the first time in my life I haven't had something leading up to a big milestone. High school was all about graduating and completing as many college classes as I could, college was all about graduating, the goal of dating was to get engaged/married, being engaged was to get married, and now I just get to live life as it is. The only big things I really have in life now are vacations and holidays. It feels like a sense of normalcy, and I'm so happy about that. Life felt extremely hectic between getting engaged and our first Christmas married (which was a total of 15 months). Settling down took some time, and now we truly get to relax. 

Well, what are the next questions people will ask? I'm not sure. Recently, my husband and I talked about tentative future plans and milestones, which has always been fun to talk about the future, no matter what it is. I remember when before we got married, we would be excited to simply plan out our furniture for our future home. Truly adulting, haha! I know that down the line, we plan on moving someday, and people will ask about that, and we'll probably just show them pictures. But then a question I hope no one ever asks me expecting a serious answer: "When are you having kids?" This will strongly be met with a "Whenever we want to" type of answer. I understand super close relatives maybe asking about what the next few years look like out of curiosity, but I don't see any of them straight up asking, "When are you having kids?" and putting on any sort of pressure. That would be met with "None of your business" if it got to that point, but never will. I've realized that this strength and confidence is exactly what I needed in order to have kids one day. If I learned how to advocate for myself so well, I'd be able to advocate for them, which is exactly what they'll need. I'm just turning into my parents (which is a good thing)! 

~ ~ ~ 

When it comes down to it, there is one thing I've taken from the song Dear Reader, which is: you don't have to answer just cause they asked you. Them asking you that question does not mean you are required. God doesn't want you to feel uncomfortable for other people's gain or curiosity. 

~ The Inspired One