Shooting Stars

If you could do your life over what would you change?
Maybe that bad haircut from 9th grade or giving into the gaucho fad of 2005?

Talk about a bad hair year!

Maybe you would have chosen different friends in middle school or tried out for the basketball team?



I was talking to my mom the other day about all the opportunity we have today. It seems that the sky really is the limit (anyone else hear about Lady Gaga performing in space in 2015?) and yet with the list of options growing longer it seems the window of opportunity is shrinking. I know as a nurse there are "many options" of where to take my career. The tricky part is that the place I want to be isn't hiring, or I'm not as qualified, or doesn't exist this side of Illinois.

If I could do my life over I wonder if I would change my career choice. I think about how much I wanted to be a wedding planner, or how I decided to be a graphic designer in ninth grade. I chuckle at the comments I get about how I should be on Broadway or go into theater (yes, yes, apparently I can't go 10 minutes without making up a song or melody). Then I remember why I decided to go into nursing. You see, that was not AT ALL my first choice. I wanted to be a Registered Dietitian. I wanted to show people how eating healthy can be fun and rewarding, not a hassle. That's what my plan was. That's what I was taking pre-requisites for. That's why I was in Anatomy and Physiology that day.
It was sometime in February. I don't remember what we were learning about. All I can really pinpoint is the feeling I had. It wasn't an overwhelming, shiveries all over, hairs stood up on my arms kind of a feeling. Instead it was like that nagging voice in the back of your head- the one that no matter how many distractions you think of you can't drown out. It kept saying, "You aren't going to be happy as a dietitian, Cami. You're going to be so bored." I ignored it. It came again, "You really should look into Nursing. There's no harm in just looking!" Fine! I decided to go to the Nursing Department and just look at an application. I wasn't even going to fill it out. But I did. I filled it out and I got all the references and background checks that I needed in the 6 days before the deadline closed. It was a miracle.
I told myself that if I actually got into the Nursing Program that that would be proof that I needed to follow that career path. If I didn't get in, I wasn't going to try again. Well, I got accepted. I hadn't even taken all of the required classes! I was off-track. I wasn't even in the same state! So, I searched for a class that would transfer up to that college and I found one. I was set. Cue the situational irony. I had signed up for the wrong class! I realized this the night before that class started and I was a mess! Luckily I found another class that would actually transfer and fit into my full time work schedule. Unfortunately, class registration closed the next day at 4, the same time I got off work 20 minutes away. Long story short, the head of the department was in a good mood that day and happened to be walking out of his office when we got there, so he let me into the full class and when September rolled around I started the Nursing Program.
You see, I know that was a long story, but I can't pretend there wasn't something greater than myself pulling the strings there. Call it fate. Call it divine intervention. Whatever it was has lead me to where I am now. If I would have followed the dietitian path I would have been at a different school when my now-husband returned to BYU-Idaho. We never would have met. We never would have fallen in love and had this crazy 8 months together. I don't know that Nursing is necessarily what I'm supposed to do for the rest of my life, but I do know that if I wouldn't have done it then, I wouldn't be where I am now. And right now, I'm pretty happy.