You Can't Always Get

What you want, what’s that about? Seriously, what is what we want about? I’m been thinking about this lately. Thinking about what I want and how do I get what I want, and how important is this. I think it is important, and I’m not quite sure why, but it has something to do with efficacy. Efficacy literally means; the ability to produce a desired or intended result. If we don’t know what we want, how to we produce a life we desire, a life that is meaningful, intentional? 

Yet how many of us were told as we were growing up that we could indeed, have what we wanted? I know I wasn’t. I don’t even know if it was something that was possible. I rarely, if ever got what I wanted, and the one time I remember getting what I wanted, I was ridiculed over it. What I was taught, indoctrinated into really, was the idea of sacrifice. That this was the meaning of life. 

The Red Plaid Dress

When I was about 7 or maybe 8, I took the bus downtown with my mom to shop at Dayton’s department store. This was a big deal, shopping with mom was a treat, as one of eight kids, we rarely got one on one time with her. Dressing well was really important to my mom. When she was out of high school, she worked at both Donaldson's and Dayton's department stores, and knew what better dresses were. She told me often of the beautiful dresses she and her sister would buy when they were young. This was the 60's and looking well-dressed was probably the most important thing in her world. This was what the hippies soon rebelled against, and we may never again see the well-heeled world that I, as a youngster grew up in. 

I don’t remember the occasion, or much else about it, but I do remember trying on dresses; and then my mom asking what dress I wanted. I wanted the red plaid dress. My mom didn’t think it suited me, but I remember really wanting that dress, and so my mom broke down and bought it for me. On the bus ride home, my mother was upset that she’d let me have my way, and she let me know that she thought it was a bad choice. I’d chosen the wrong dress. 

I don’t remember the actual event as much as I remember my mom telling this story about it, many times over. She was upset that she’d bought the dress for me; and then I never wanted to wear the dress, since it was associated with such bad feelings. And then, me not wanting to wear the dress, prompted the story that my mom would even tell to strangers on the bus. It seemed like that year, every time we went somewhere together, my mother would tell this story. The story about how I made such a bad choice, and how my mother bought this dress for me and then I never wore it. She would tell this story in front of me, and I would feel the pain and embarrassment, over and over again with each telling. 

So, now that my children are mostly grown, and I don’t have to devote almost all my energy to taking care of them, and I’ve worked toward a career that suits and supports me, what do I want? I feel a little trepidation even asking myself that, as if to want in and of itself is not cool. “Who me, no, I’m fine, I don’t want anything.” Cool as a cucumber in my not wanting anything. Yet this story haunts me lately, I think it has something to tell me. 

I don’t have the answers yet, on how this wanting is an important part of being human, but it’s on my mind. And I think if we let ourselves want what we want, we can be powerful in our lives. Which is yet another whole piece of the puzzle-- another emotion that we mostly don’t want children to feel: powerful. I'm relearning to let myself want what I want, to know what I want, and to feel powerful enough to believe I can have it, and then get it. We'll see where this goes.