Blog-tember Day 3 prompt: “When I grow up I want to be….” Feel free to answer as your 5-year-old self or as of now. This is a pretty generous guessing game, but what follows is the basic gist of me answering that question, mostly in relation to my career, as best as I can remember, in each year of my life. Enjoy.

• 5 – 8 years old: An artist
• 9 – 13 years old: A dancer
• 14 years old: The first female Pope
• 15 years old: Mmm I don’t know, but Rachel from Friends seems like she has it all figured out. So maybe her?
• 16 years old: A Journalist, like Angelina Jolie’s character in Life or Something Like It
• 17 years old: Broadcast Journalist who choreographs Show Choirs on the side
• 18 years old: Show Choir choreographer who dabbles in Journalism on the side
• 18.5 years old: When I grow up, I wanna be famous, I wanna be a star, I wanna be in movies
• 19 years old: Something to do with Business, I guess?
• 20 years old: Something to do with Business that’s creative. But not Sales. Definitely not Sales.
• 21 years old: Do I have any other options than Retail? Okay, so Retail.
• 22 years old: Anything but Retail.
• 23 years old: Someone who can wear jeans to work.
• 24 years old: A Writer/Lawyer/Journalist/Marketing Prodigy/Sales Guru/Television Enthusiast/Photographer/Cat-mom/Professional Sleeping Person
• 25 years old: Happy. Challenged professionally and satisfied personally — but mostly, I think I just want to enjoy the ride.

And on the note of growing up and careers, here’s one of my favorite Nora Ephron quotes, from her 1996 commencement speech at Wellesley College. This about sums up where my head’s at right now.

 “This is the season when a clutch of successful women — who have it all — give speeches to women like you and say, to be perfectly honest, you can’t have it all. Maybe young women don’t wonder whether they can have it all any longer, but in case of you are wondering, of course you can have it all. What are you going to do? Everything, is my guess. It will be a little messy, but embrace the mess. It will be complicated, but rejoice in the complications. It will not be anything like what you think it will be like, but surprises are good for you. And don’t be frightened: you can always change your mind. I know: I’ve had four careers and three husbands.”

I think when I grow up, I want to continue embracing the mess. Cheers to that!