choose your own adventure

Remember those books? I looooved them. I would check out every single one at the library and rush through them just so I could go back and reread every option and end up with a different outcome.

More and more I feel like I am living one of those stories. I am at a point where I am questioning my decisions, where I am and what I am focusing on. I am mentally going back to the last point and imagining the outcome if I made a different decision.

This isn't a matter of regret or discontent. It's a throwback to my childhood, a game utilizing my imagination, a pondering of "what ifs". I look back on certain people or situations in my life and now am so glad I ended up on THIS adventure. I can look back and figure out what the outcome would have been had I chose differently. Some of the outcomes are sad, some are frightful and others entice me.

What held me back from the other adventures? Oh, lots of things. Mostly myself, but definitely a combo of fear, uncertainty and protection from God. Sometimes it was simply God using my fear of the uncertainty to protect me... as weird as that may sound.

I guess this is what happens as you approach the big 3-0. I look at where I am in life and wonder what would have been otherwise- if I had moved to Berkeley at 17, if I had let myself fall in love with him, if I had taken that job in NY, if if if if....

There are so many ways this story can go. So many outcomes still to be eliminated. I am just really glad to be on this adventure. Did I really choose it? Nah, but I am thankful for it. It's my story. It's full of a lot of comedy and a bit of tragedy, but it's mine. Turn the page please.