Montana Jones

Growth

My early growth was measured with pencil marks on the kitchen wall. Every year at my birthday there was a ritual of taking off shoes and standing straight, mom or dad would hold a ruler atop my head and make a mark on the wall. Later on my growth was measured differently with tests and report cards. And then it was measured with awards and promotions. Sitting today at the end of my first Montana summer season, business is winding down, spare time is increasing, I feel like I have grown. I don't have any pencil marks on the wall to show it. No outgrown clothes. No grades or awards. Only an opportunity to do it again next year.

I could measure my growth with time. I can now say I have been doing this a year much like the people around me can say "I've been here eight years" or ten or 13 or… I could fudge a little and count all the years I worked as peon instead of head honcho, then I could count this as my fifth summer. But that is not really accurate and totally fails as a measure of how much I have grown this year.

I could measure growth from my mistakes. Mistakes are the best teachers and I made a slew of them. My list of things I will do differently next year is long. Even with all the mistakes there are no regrets. I am proud that I jumped in with both feet and made a go of it.

I would like to be able to look back one day at the pencil marks on the wall and be able to say "wow, that 2005 was a real growth spurt." But there comes a time in life where growth is not so easily measured. Like a soldier returned from war people can say "He has changed." It would be true of me, I have changed, I can feel it. I would like to call it growth. But I miss having others look on me with admiration and say "look how big you are getting."

Posted by: Montana Jones / 6:12 AM