Call me crazy, but I really enjoy shopping!  Now I know that some of you have a mental picture of a car loaded down with bags and a wallet with nothing left but maxed out credit cards.  Nah, that’s not my style.  I much more prefer the one skirt that I can dress up or down, or mix and match it with what I already own to create several new looks.  I find great pleasure in walking around a department store just to discover the latest trends, then figuring out a way to re-create something similar but more modest.  It’s more than just clothes and fashion that I do this with too.  I like picking up an aqua picture frame and knowing that it could have been so much more, then figuring out how to add a little pizzazz to it.

I also find great delight in shopping for someone else.  I like knowing that I have picked something that they’ll enjoy, because I got to know them.  Right on down to the gift bag or wrapping paper.  I recently learned that my efforts aren’t in vain with that either, when I put Dove’s Dark Chocolate in a pink and orange gift bag and my friend replied “you know me so well”.

As much as I typically enjoy the entire shopping experience, you let me find something that claims “one size fits all” and you might as well had popped my birthday balloons, because that’s a sad moment.  One size does not fit all!  I mean, that claim is just outrageous.  It’s more than just clothes that don’t fit “all”.  I could have wrapped that same gift in a black and red bag, and I can promise you that my friend would not have been smiling and saying “You know me so well!”  Look around—we aren’t all the same; it won’t fit “all”.  So, what is it that makes us think relationships are all going to look the same?

Recently, I found myself beginning to struggle in ways that I never have before.  I was beginning to experience emotions that I still can’t even explain.  God was beginning to reveal things to me that have me excited and honored, but honestly a little freaked out all at once.  I wasn’t sure what to do with all of that and was honestly feeling rather emotionally sucker punched.  Many people tried to tell me what to do with all of that and were quick to share their own stories.  (Don’t get me wrong—that played a big role in my ability to figure it all out.)  It was what one friend texted me a couple hours after she heard me out that did the trick though:

Your talk about your fairy tale just made me think how they are all so different but with equally happy endings….Cinderella had wicked step sisters, Belle had to kiss a beast, Rapunzal was kidnapped.  You get the picture.

I read that and thought, You’re right.  One size does not fit all!  I cannot expect it to look a certain way.  God has already lovingly authored the story.  My job is to just remember to go patiently in the direction that the path leads and enjoy the ride along the way.  While there may be villains or scoundrels that I didn’t expect or pasts that I didn’t see coming or roadblocks to overcome along the way—happily ever after does await and it will come when it’s time for that part of the story.  It will not be one-size fits all, but it will absolutely be a my-size fairy tale.