once upon a time...

Once upon a time, there lived, in the decade of the 1970s, a little girl with big brown eyes and long brown braids.  In the midst of shouts of "Make love not war!"  this little girl lived an idyllic life with her 2 parents, 2 sisters and 1 brother.  This little girl's favorite time of day was the quiet dark of her bed.  When the lights went down and silence filled the air, she would lie awake writing stories in her head... stories of good vs. bad, true love always and happily ever after.  She never wrote these stories down because she knew that a pen in her hand could not keep up with the words in her head.  Instead, she simply would start a new story when an old one had been forgotten.


Once upon a time, that little girl of the 70s grew up to be a teen in the 1980s.  Punk rock, big hair and preppy clothes filled this girl's high school.  Though there were bumps and bruises along the way, the brown-eyed girl weathered her teen years well... those 2 parents of hers prayed her through.  And, in those high school years, she learned to speak well.  Speech class became a favorite... and so did typing class... she finally had a way for her hands to keep up with the words in her head... and so she learned to type those stories and speeches in her head.  Except at night, when she would still lie awake and allow words to fill her mind and become stories in her head.


Once upon a time, that brown-eyed girl grew up and graduated from high school in the 1980s and from college at the beginning of the 1990s.  Life beckoned.  So much to do, so little time.  After time, she found a job that fit her and a little house to rent and life seemed good.  All the while, though, she would still write speeches and stories in her head in the quiet and dark of the night... still of good vs. bad, true love always and happily ever after.  And, eventually true love found her and she vowed 'til death do us part (which she mistakenly thought meant happily ever after).


Once upon a time, that happily newly-wedded brown-eyed bride became a mom and thought "some day I'll really pursue my dreams of speaking and writing but right now, I'm living the dream of coloring books and LEGOs."  Though the days sometimes seemed like years and the years seemed like a day, the brown-eyed mom loved her life as wife, mom, homeschool teacher and household engineer... though at night she often fell asleep before any words could form a story in her mind.


Once upon a time, the years flew by for the brown-eyed mom and the years revealed what the days could not see... real-life stories and speeches had filled this mother's life.  She had been living what she had often dreamed about in the quiet dark of the night... good vs. bad, true love always and happily ever after.  And, facing her 41st birthday, the brown-eyed mother said, "I think it's time to pursue those dreams of long ago."


Once upon a time, not so long ago, this same brown-eyed woman heard of She Speaks conference for Christian women seeking to improve their gifts of writing and speaking.  And, so, she began to pray about attending... and then the time for the conference came and went.  So, she prayed some more... and, one morning this week, she read Lysa's blog about a Cecil Murphy scholarship opportunity for the She Speaks 2011 conference.  


...and, she lay awake in the quiet and still night, writing her blog post entry in her head.