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
Robert Frost
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.
I was talking to a friend today about finishing my MLS and why I don’t feel jubilant. Instead, I am feeling sad and scared – and angry with myself for feeling sad and scared. I can point to a possible reasons I am feeling this way. For starters, finishing school and the obligatory graduations have not been 100% happy occasions – people I cared about were always missing. Or, I am finished with my last venture into higher education means I have more years behind me than ahead of me. Or, and this is where I really go off the rails: what if my job isn’t enough? Am I too easily bored? What if I did not learn enough? What if the people I work with find out I am not well-suited to be a librarian? Is this the sort of work I am supposed to be doing to make me happy?
Phew. Yeah, long list of self-doubts and that is just the beginning. Still doesn’t explain why I am feeling sad and scared, when I should be happy.
Then my friend (also, my therapist, if I am being honest. I know, I am not supposed to think of him as my friend but he really would be, if I had met him any other place than his office) suggested that I am grieving for not having done this degree earlier, now that I have changed my life so significantly for the better. Is that possible?
Yes, I think that is possible. It is possible I am sad because I can see another path I could have taken and I didn’t. But I think it is too complicated a feeling to simply describe as regret at the road not taken. I think it is possible to be satisfied with my choice, at not taking the other road, and still be sad that I did not take it. I am satisfied with my choice because I know that it led to other things that I am grateful for, abjectly grateful for. And, I am sad that I will not find out what other things might have come to me, what other paths might have opened up if I had made a different choice.
Another thing that I realize now, in my old age, is that there were several paths. There was not just one turning point or even one, most important, turning point. So, I really have more than one path to look back on and be sad about, to grieve for.
Does that mean I am not where I am supposed to be? I don’t think so.
I think that phrases like “where I am supposed to be” are problematic, though. I wonder if we fall into phrases like that, or having a “soul mate”, or assigning words like “fate” or “destiny” because it is terrifying to imagine that we had other choices. It is terrifying to imagine there might have been better choices, choices that brought us more happiness (or success, or money, or whatever). Better to imagine we had no choice but the path we took.
I did have a choice, though, at almost every step. I say “almost” because not every turning point in the path is a choice. Sometimes things happen that we have no control over and they change our trajectory. If I could have my mother back, I would. Even with knowing I would not be in the exact place I am now, I wish I had my mother, alive and well. But that is not possible and I made choices, however much I did not understand what I was doing at the time, in direct reaction to her death.
So, here I am.
I reread the Frost poem* and I hear sadness and fear and anger that I didn’t when I first read it as a teenager. I remember interpreting the poem as: He’s saying you shouldn’t choose what everyone eIse chooses, you should go in the opposite direction and that is what will be the right path. (In fairness to my 16-year-old self, I knew the poem was saying a lot more than that but I don’t think I had a handle on what that was.) In essence, I thought Frost was advocating for us to go against the status quo and suggesting that, at the end, lie happiness and fulfillment.
Nope, I don’t think he is saying that at all, not now with some 40 years of experience behind me.
Though as for that the passing there
(WAS THE PATH I THOUGHT WAS SO DIFFERENT, WAS IT? REALLY SO DIFFERENT?)
Had worn them really about the same
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
(WHO AM I KIDDING? THE CHOICES ARE NOT SO CLEAR AND OBVIOUS AS A GODDAMN ROAD IN THE WOODS. I WISH.)
I doubted if I should ever come back.
Leaving aside my not-very-sophisticated literary analysis, the point I am trying to make is this: I think it is possible to acknowledge that I could have taken different paths, be grateful for where I am and what I have, and still, still, be sad about the things I did not do and the choices I did not make.
And, sometimes I am not sad when I think about those choices I did not make – I am fucking pissed off. I am angry about what I lost when I did not make a different choice, angry at myself, angry (when I can let myself) at the people who did not help me and should have. I feel rage sometimes at the unfairness and neglect that put me in a place where I thought I had no choices. I feel rage at myself for not looking up and asking myself, “What have you got to lose?”
Yet, here I am.
I am finished with my Master’s of Library Science. Tonight, we are having a brief, online graduation and a celebration at home. I have a job I genuinely like, enough that I wake up in the morning and have a list of things I look forward to tackling – and that pays me (!), so I can help take care of my family. I feel the weight of this change on me; the momentousness of this transition is significant. I have started down a new path and I still have so many things I am grateful for.
I am sad, too. Sad, not just that I did not do this earlier but sad, because I know I did not see this path as a possibility. It’s not as though it was laid out in front of me and I simply rejected it – I did not see it, for a whole lot of other reasons than thinking it wasn’t the right one for me. Which tells me I should be gentle on myself, instead of berating myself for not doing this earlier.
So, here’s to me! Here’s to us! Here’s to this road, taken.
* I just remembered that I mentioned a few posts back that I wanted to write about a different poem. And I think I said I don’t read poetry. Except for Emily Dickinson. Then I remembered Robert Frost and how some of his poems have affected me. And Emerson, as I said. And the poems by Elizabeth Bishop that I find really meaningful. Okay, so maybe it is not accurate to say I never read poetry.