The Road Less Traveled.

Right now I stand in this limbo, this undefined territory. This place with no foreshadowing, because even I don’t know which path I’ll pick next. I can’t seem to stay away for long. I could pretend I don’t like this, but who am I kidding? I put myself here. Over and over and over and over. I am comfortable in the discomfort, content in the unknown.

When I hike, I don’t like to stay on the trail. I like to explore, to find nature that I wasn’t suppose to find, to climb trees that I wasn’t suppose to climb. Someone made a path that assures a safe trip. A wonderful, beautiful, physically taxing, and safe trip. But safety isn’t always best, is it? Safety lacks risks, it lacks guts, it lacks challenge. It lacks the opportunity to see things you didn’t know you were looking for, to experience things you didn’t know you were missing out on.

I once built myself a path. It led to a graduation in blue and silver, an honors diploma handed to me by George Mariz, and intermural soccer the whole way through. This path was marked with beautiful sights. A roommate anyone would dream of having, a job that would get me killer recommendations, a town full of opportunities and beauty, and a group of friends who said NO to nothing. This path seems pretty perfect, no? At one point, this path was only a few steps long. It included nothing more than a check mark next to I AM ATTENDING and a newly bought bed set. Somehow those few steps turned into a beautifully organized, brilliant home. But it had no forks, no smaller paths breaking off. And it was marked with signs: This way to Safety.

I don’t like to stay on the trail. I like to explore. And somewhere between the I can’t wait to go back and the I wouldn’t trade Western for anything, I glanced away from my destination, from the blue and silver graduation. And what I saw was alluring. I saw myself on a team, with a coach and a soccer bag, getting onto an airplane to fly to a game. I saw myself warming up, a college logo on my chest. I saw myself eating, breathing, sleeping soccer. I saw sprinting, lifting, panting. I felt my quads burning and my hands tingling. And so I started a new path. Right now, that one is only a few steps long. It isn’t marked with beautiful Bellingham, it doesn’t have the perfect roommate, and it doesn’t come with the dream job. But my last path, the one that would be so easy to hop back onto, was pretty barren when it was just a few steps long. There is nothing to say that a new path couldn’t become just as beautiful, as tantalizing, as amazing, as the old path. Is there?

I stand here, not knowing whether I will charge ahead at the unknown, or turn around and take the path I already created. I stand here, not knowing where I will sleep for the next nine months, and I am content. I am happy I have this choice to make, happy that I followed a passion to create these options for myself. And I am happy because I know that no matter which path I take, I will gain something wonderful in place of what I may lose. There is no bad option here. Taking the old path would be a relief. A wonderful, fun, exciting relief. I would not be unhappy if I hopped back on. I am positive of this. I think, though, that if I turned around, I would wonder where that small, desolate, dirt path would have taken me, what it may have turned into. I would question what sights I wasn’t seeing, what wonders I wasn’t experiencing. And who is to say that I can’t turn around if my new path totally sucks?