Excerpt: An Unexpected Life

She made her makeshift bed in the middle of the wagon. Thomas had said something about needing to keep everything balanced in the wagon while it was moving, so there were things packed in the front as well as the back, leaving a space nicely nestled in the middle where she and Thomas could sleep. As she lay there, hoping for sleep to come, she thought about her own bed back home, and how soft it was. She had never before gotten a splinter from her mattress, and she missed little things like being able to allow her foot to dangle off the edge of her bed. But then she forced herself to think forward, to begin daydreaming about her new life.
She still had the idea and hope that she and Thomas would be able to go into some sort of business together. Without children to raise, she felt as if she had little purpose in her life and this thought bothered her tremendously. She wanted to do something, something for the betterment of society or at least for her own little corner of the world, wherever that turned out to be. Free of the societal confines of Philadelphia, Elizabeth felt as if a whole new world would open up for her. She could finally do something with the mind that God had graced her with, and not feel like she was just wasting her life away. She fell asleep with dreams of owning a very successful business, being a full partner for her husband, flowing through her head.