Little Glass House.

Of late there has been a theme in my conversations with my friends. It kind of looks like this:

As a performer studying to be an even better performer, I hear all the time that you shouldn't pursue a career in acting, singing, movie-making, etc, if you don't really, really want it. It comes up all the time in theater classes, and thusly, my friends and I talk about it frequently. The other day, Pancake Girl (a.k.a. White Beyonce/Emma Stone) and I were once again talking over pancakes, and this very idea came up. Both of us are performers because we love it, but we don't have Rachel Barry syndrome. Neither of us ever said, "I WILL be an actor/singer. That's that." Instead we both just kind of exist and grow in the college theater atmosphere, waiting and preparing for what really want... to be parents.

Umm, but not with each other. Just clearing that up. We'd start laughing if we ever tried to make a baby.

So we don't want to be actors/singers so badly we could die. We just want family. I thinks that's why I'm so wishy-washy about being a performer, or being anything at all. I already know what I want, and now I'm not so ashamed to admit it.

As I have mulled this over and expressed my feelings to friends, I have felt very content with what I am feeling. If you have thoroughly stalked (erm, I mean followed) my blog, you've probably noticed that I have changed my life goals, especially my career-oriented ones at least one thousand times. I know there is nothing wrong with that; hell, I'm in college! This is what I'm here for. But I think I have been beating around the bush, dancing around what I really want. And now, I feel quite distinctly that I've hit the target: I want to be a householder/homemaker/stay-at-home dad.

Whatever word you want to call it, I think you get the picture. I used to be ashamed that this is all I wanted. I've been told all my life that I need to be ultra-ambitious. I have felt obligated to sap myself dry. I feel that what I have been taught in school, Sunday or otherwise, is to never settle for being the stay-at-home parent, and as a man, be ashamed for wanting that. But when my thoughts wander in class, they wander to the home I will create one day. And I am encouraged, because I know that I will a be great father. I know I will completely give myself to my family because I can feel myself growing and changing... preparing, I guess, to take on such a role.

In what I find to be a strange, yet rewarding shift in mind set, I have come to deeply empathize with Mormon women here at BYU. The pressure is on to get married and have a family, then stay home full-time to take care of their children. I recognize that as exactly the plan that I want for myself. It makes me smile to think that I have finally found an LDS life path that resonates with me, and it is gendered to be a woman's life path. It disgusts me that I can still feel a little bit of shame for wanting what I do. And I wonder why it lingers. Perhaps I still feel like I have to prove my masculinity, and I am afraid of subverting it. I know that isn't what I'm doing by accepting this... I'll keep working on that.

Now, I don't plan on waiting around for my white knight (*insert Kristin Chenoweth solo here*). I didn't come to BYU to get married. I have a life right now, and it's mine to spend on the things that matter. It's just comforting to know that I actually do feel called to be something when I grow up. I'm going to have a fantastic career in the field of fatherhood.

And I am looking forward to it.

P.S. Still holding out for David Archuleta; Keeping my fingers crossed :P

Drool...