Dreams vs. Reality ... and Sometimes the Twain Shall Meet (Mary Strand)

This month at YA Outside the Lines, we're talking about dream jobs vs. Plan B, or what you might call reality.

I didn't work in high school (except at sports, ferociously), so this isn't a YA or young adult post for me. I did work ungodly hours in college, mostly just to get by ... but even so, three of my main ongoing jobs were working in the college library, working at a law firm, and working in a country-rock bar, so my interests were definitely met.

But ... adulthood. Time for a career as opposed to a job.

When I was 15, I was walking down the street one day with my mom. Out of the blue she suddenly said, "So. Have you decided? Will you be a doctor or a lawyer?"

We'd never before discussed careers, and my main thought at age 15 was basketball and whether I might possibly be able to play pro ball (no, they didn't pay enough then). But I was indeed reading books about lawyers and politics, especially politics, although I don't think my mom knew that.

Really, the whole conversation came out of nowhere.

My first thought, not uttered aloud: I hate blood. So, given a choice of A or B, I simply said, "Lawyer," even though there are a million other choices, and it wasn't my mom's business to make demands about my future career.

So I decided, at age 15, that I'd go to law school, practice law for a few years, and then become a U.S. Senator. Not President, because people shoot at Presidents. And not that I'd totally given up on my dream job of pro basketball player. Or possibly even pro tennis player, but within a year (after I started playing tennis five hours a day) I knew I didn't love tennis enough to play it professionally.

Being me, I followed through. Work and activities in college were focused on what would look good on college applications. (Besides working at Brat Kabin, the bar, but a girl's gotta have a life, right? Right.)

So I became a lawyer, and I was also doing politics, and in fact a fellow young lawyer friend, Amy Klobuchar, started taking the steps I'd always imagined, headed for the U.S. Senate. And she's there now (brava!), and I watched all the things she was doing (on top of her own law practice, no less), and I decided I didn't want that.

Thirteen years into my law practice, I took my first maternity leave, so I naturally decided to write a novel. (Because what else was I going to do for six weeks, right? Right.) And three years later, an unfortunate series of events (9/11 plus my oldest sister's unrelated sudden death) caused me to rethink life, so I left law and started writing novels full time. And several years after that, I jumped into the music biz, first as a lark and then, starting a few years ago, as a serious career-type thing. While still writing novels. And, yes, it's insanely difficult to do both and also sleep.

In my shift from law to novels to music, though, I would say that all have been dream jobs. (And hello: so was working in a bar.) But I do understand Plan B. You've got to eat and put a roof over your head and maybe raise kids and hopefully buy my latest album (I Don't Need Your Permission) (you know you want to; ha ha), and, as I did in college, you might make job choices simply to pay the bills. But I will note that, even in college, I went after jobs I thought would be fun.

So I guess all I can say is: go after your dreams. And if you need a Plan B, do what you can to turn that into a dream, too.

Mary Strand is the author of Pride, Prejudice, and Push-Up Bras and three other novels in the Bennet Sisters YA series. You can find out more about her books and music at marystrand.com.