Not Where I was Heading

This is hardly where I thought I would be. The reality of it bites at me everyday. I want to do something more significant than teach the ABC's, clean up milk spills, wipe down tables, mediate between 5 year olds, be pulled and prodded for my attention. I want a different type of significance. A significance more related to building up individuals in their identities, maybe in hopes of building up my own. Everyday as I try to get motivated to go to work with kindergarteners, I see life as a kind of a cruel joke. I thought that if I just followed all the rules and got good grades, life would somehow reward me with a good job or at least a job related to my 7 years of study. I thought if I separated myself from the American dream of career, money, and stability, and abandoned myself to a higher calling, the other things would come naturally and without much struggle. Surely God could bring those things my way with a snap of his fingers. Surely I am not alone in these questions, thoughts, regrets. I have been trying to be joyful, to be satisfied, to enjoy little tokens of life. For the most part, I do, and I am thankful. But I am also scared that I have gotten so accustomed to seeing life as cruel that I am unable to dream that it could be different. From where I sit now, it looks like when I get to the end, I'll look back and say "Well, that was the best I could do." I feel trapped in Kindergarten forever by time and money and circumstances.