Who Said?

Growing up, I heard a lot in school about the "American Dream". Marriage, high paying jobs, house with the white picket fence and a wrap-around porch, dogs and kids filling the yard, family around the grill on Fourth of July, driving a minivan to cart our football team of a family to practice and school, rocking chairs and sweet tea and firefly catching. The list could go on forever.  

(via)

  Who decided that was the American Dream, though? Who sat down and made the list that set the bar for our lives?   Why are these things so important? Are you successful if you don't have them when it's all said and done?   Being a newlywed and making out our future plan, I realize how constricting the American Dream can be.  Sure, I would love to have all of the things listed. I hope to have a vanload of kids and dogs to fill the yard, to enjoy sweet tea on our porch swing with my husband, to have that beautiful fence, but at what point does striving to reach this goal become unhealthy? At what point do you stop reaching for that image that has been pounded into your head and start enjoying your life for what it is now?   If you've been around these parts for any time at all, you'll know we struggle with being content. We're so excited and eager for what's to come that enjoying the here and now is difficult because we're so far from obtaining the tangible things that the American Dream brings.  Just yesterday, I found a house I could not live without, and my dad reminded me that it's not just a mortgage, it's taxes and insurance and down payments. Needless to say, my heart is broken. I think I have really found the source for my inability to be content. I was looking back through some coursework from high school, and in one English class, we spent eighteen weeks (half of a 36 week semester... two whole semester quarters) talking about the American Dream and how to get there. Why was it so imperative to spend so much time teaching us about it when some of us may never obtain it?  I graduated with a class of 150 people. I guarantee that teacher that 1/8 of the class of 2010 may never have that picket fence.   That brings me to this question... Does my generation tweak the American Dream to be what we need it to be or do we all feel like we're constantly in this race to make it to that end goal? (via)   I look at our future plan and it makes me think a lot about our lives and wonder if we'll ever reach that fenced in, multi acre end goal.   We'll be in an apartment for a while... one bedroom for now, and two bedroom soon. We'll be in the two bedroom until we're done paying off debt, while we save for a down payment, and even after we have kid(s) probably.  What's wrong with that? My dad says to be careful making that plan because once we have a child, he/she will eat through that down payment savings and we won't ever make it to a house.   Why not? Why does that seem impossible? Am I just hopelessly dreaming that this plan will work? Does it really matter if we ever get the house?   Why isn't the dream just to be.... happy? Why isn't that enough? As much as I itch and fight to get out of that apartment, I am so happy with our life. I love sharing it with friends, coming home and being with my husband daily, sharing life with our church family.   All of that brings me to this. Last Friday, I was smacked between the eyes with a song. It's not new, but it was new to me. Enjoy.....