Pursuing a Childhood Dream in My 50th Journey Around the Sun
I turned 49 this weekend.
My wife, my parents, and I went to the Taste of Maine for my birthday dinner. It’s a classic Maine restaurant I hadn’t been to in years. The kind of place that’s a little touristy but the locals go too. We’d picked it because we’d read it was going under new ownership. One more visit before it changed.
While we were eating, my sister Jennie and her husband Erik called to wish me a happy birthday. I told her where we were, and she said, “Oh, I remember.”
Erik jumped in. “Oh, Bumpa. That was his favorite place. He loved that place.” Bumpa was Erik’s grandfather.
Jennie chimed in, “It was Bamp’s too!”
Bamp was our grandfather.
Everyone had their restaurant in our family. The one you’d choose when it was your turn to pick. For my birthday, I always chose Cook’s Lobster House. So did Jennie. The Taste of Maine was Bamp’s.
Sitting there, surrounded by all that nostalgia, I started thinking about how much those family rituals shaped me. Not just the birthday dinners. The weekly ones.
Every Friday night from the time I was probably 5 to 10, my family piled into our brown Chevy Blazer and drove to Lewiston for our weekly grocery shopping adventure. Dinner came first, usually at a tiny pizza place called Yanni’s. Maybe six tables, a hallway to a back door with a couple more. There was a jukebox in the corner, and I’d play “Beat It” as many times as my parents would let me. On occasion we’d go to Bonanza instead. A change of pace. And they had Jell-O, which I loved!
Then we’d split up. My mom went grocery shopping at Shaw’s. My dad, sister and me headed to Bookland.
My dad would go to the magazines and set my sister and me free to explore.
That was the part I lived for. Nobody telling me what to read or where to go. I could roam the whole store, pull anything off the shelf, sit on the floor, and disappear into it. For about an hour every week, I felt like I had my own personal library.
My parents didn’t have to do that. They chose to. They could have made us stay at their side or dragged us through the grocery store. Instead, they gave us room to explore.
That free range approach to parenting showed up everywhere. The woods where I grew up, climbing trees, following streams, building forts. The campground where I ran free with the other kids. The bike trips crossing the Androscoggin into Lisbon Falls. My parents trusted me with space, and that space let me become curious.
Somewhere in those Friday nights at Bookland, surrounded by all those books, I decided I wanted to write children’s books. I think I was probably 7.
Then life happened. School, sports, work, building businesses. The dream didn’t disappear. It just waited.
One of my goals before I turn 50 is to fulfill a dream I’ve carried for over 40 years.
I’ve written the manuscript for two children’s books. Now I want to bring them to life. I’m planning to self-publish, which means the Heart-Strong community will be an important part of how it happens.
So, here’s a little birthday ask. If this story resonates, I’d love for you to share it with at least one person who might want to come along for the adventure. That’s it. Just one share.
I write about love and fear with the hope of helping people step out of the boxes that keep them from living as full human beings. Whether those boxes are childhood conditioning, systems that center capital over everything that actually matters, or walls that were designed to separate.
These books are part of that. They’re for kids, and for the grownups reading to them. They’re for everyone who’s been told to put a part of themself away. And for every person who unfortunately did.
49 is going to be a great year. I can feel it.
Learn more about the adventure at www.heart-strong.org
Having space to explore while growing up, so blessed.
Happy birthday!