Reflecting

Last weekend as Mr. X and I paved (aka hired people) the patio in the back, he told me about his hate of the question "Where do you see yourself in five or ten years?".
He was saying how when he was eighteen or so he was asked this question quite a bit.
He was graduating from high school and all.
And it always annoyed him.
At eighteen he had no idea.
So many things were up in the air.
So many variables could change.

But he did not think he saw himself here.
He could never imagine ten years ago that he would be completing a home improvement project with his girlfriend on a house.
That he would be in school completing a degree in a program he never even thought about at eighteen.
That he would be in love with me.

And of course that conversation made me do my own reflecting.
As I sat in my class on Monday morning, I could not believe I was there.
As the class discussed various science curriculums, I was sitting in awe.
I was a full time student.
To become a teacher!
Not working (in a traditional sense).
I am not spending my Monday morning in cube land.
How incredibly weird!

I was asked Mr. X's least favorite question not too long ago.
Actually almost exactly five years go to the month.
During an interview with my previous company.
Being an education student was not my answer.
It was not even on my radar.
My answer was some mundane answer about moving up the corporate ladder world.
And maybe I did want that at some point but not now at all.

It amazes me about how much I have changed.
Perhaps through normal maturing.
Perhaps through the widowdom.
But the reflection in the mirror quite different than five years ago.
And especially ten years ago.