Words

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

     -- Robert Frost

What if you got to take the other road? What if that road looped around 

and you were staring at that fork again and this time we can look back 

on the path chosen and be able to wonder what it would be like to go 

the other way. Both paths looked good, right? I mean, can 

you really look at the complete picture of your life thus far and not say, 

it would be interesting to split off right there and go a different way. 

What if I had chosen a different college? Would my high school boyfriend 

and I still be together? I would never have met my fiance, would I have 

met him at a different time?  What if I had taken that trip to New Zealand? 

What if I hadn't had that one night stand?

These are not questions that simply relive one night and continue the course 

of one's life in the same way.  These questions dramatically change the 

life and choices a person has made for themselves.  One can make the fate 

argument, but I find it pointless in this case.  I chose to ignore any 

type of fate, and simply look at a decision in my life.  Two paths to 

take, and take the other. Would you look down that grassy path and say 

it's not worth it? Go back down that known existence.  Is that unknown too 

unknown, can you loop around again?  

I guess my answer would depend on when I make that diversion. If it's after 

I met my fiance, can I bring him with me down my other path? If it's before, 

will I remember him as I enter a world where we haven't met? 

I guess, as I struggle within my love for Robert Frost the question of his 

message stays with me.  Am I meant to look down the path I have taken as the 

difference I should embrace, or am I to question each decision I make as if 

I were staring at these paths? Is his poem to tell me that all decisions are 

easy, or that they are all huge complexities that we must combat?  

This internal struggle, ironically, has led me back to the same conclusion 

which Frost himself had reached. The path I chosen made all the difference, 

what difference that was I am not sure I am supposed to know.