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
I once dreamt of law school.
It was during my first four years at college when I studied Political Science and first encountered Plato, Aristotle, and the merry crew of philosophers.
Life took a different direction. I fell more in love with my babies than I was with thinkers, and I couldn't imagine the countless hours I would spend away from them at school - and then at work -in order to be successful. So I went back to work for my family.
I think there are those who believe working for family is a different kind of dream come true, and that may be accurate in some cases.
In my case, it has been anything but a dream come true. It has, however, meant Joe and I could spend the time we wanted to spend with our sons. We could raise them rather than leaving them the majority of the time with someone else. As they grew, it meant we could attend their events and take them places. For that I'm eternally grateful, and it gives me peace to know I haven't wasted a single moment of my life.
I always took pride in the fact that when I was at my job, I gave all my effort and thought and energy to it. For years I've taken work with me when I walk out the door - carrying it home or on vacation or to personal events. When I look back on the things I've accomplished and learned so that I could be better at my job, I have reason to be proud of what I've done. I know that things happen at my job because I'm there and that when I'm no longer there, those same things won't happen. For the first time in my life, I'm okay with that. I'm disengaged. Partly, I think, disengagement happens over the decades; it's impossible to maintain the energy and passion of the early years of anything. In my case it was spurred by my parents and their nasty divorce.
The last three years have been consummed with divorce lawyers and financial experts and documents. Thousands and thousands of pages of documents. There are, apparently, never enough ways to document the same data. Trust me; I've documented ad nauseum. Trying to explain and unravel the forty years of activity is something of a waste of time since no one seems to actually understand the tangled web they've woven. And really, who cares? Seems to me it's as simple as this: assign a value to everything and divide it in half. Voila. Divorced! But toss into the mix some mental distress and substance abuse and greedy hands, and all hell breaks loose.
Meanwhile, our family no longer exists as it once did - and it never will again. Resources - financial, physical, and spiritual - have been consummed and may never be replenished. I have learned that my job is just a job and the joy in doing it is no longer there.
And the bottom line? I've caught myself thinking of those early plans to attend law school, my road never taken. Having worked closely with lawyers for the last three years, I'm so thankful I never had the chance to pursue law school. It's clear to me: my choice to be where I was has made all the difference.
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