Frosty Roads

It was in the seventh grade that I first read The Road Not Taken, by Robert Frost.  At first read it was the image of being in leafy woods, alone with Nature, that drew me closer.  I could smell the leaves, yellow and brown and I drew a still closer.  The air was crisp and once I reached down to feel the softness of the grass I couldn't help myself .  I tumbled headlong into that poem and have never really left it.        

A bit older than when I first fell into the poem, but certainly not wise, I truly believed there was one best road for me and if I looked carefully enough I would see which one it was.  They all looked good to me then.  And although I couldn't see what lay beyond the bend in the road, there was no reason to believe that it would be anything less perfect than what I could see from that painless vantage. 

And so we, my friends and I, like woodland faeries scattered with the breeze.  Some landed well. They found destinations. But I wasn't ready for a destination, and I thought that I could always find my way back to where the roads split and make a different choice.  It couldn't be that serious.  It was only beautiful, timeless, carefree routes through a lovely wood. I thought to know all the roads.  My plan was to do it all.  Simple.  Spring, summer, autumn days stretched out endlessly with not a sign of winter.

And down the road I went and found so many turns.  A tree fallen across the path.  A bridge washed out, but never mind.  I trekked to the nearest, clearest turn, sometimes cross-country.  Sometimes through moss, sometimes though briers.  I began to understand that way leads on to way and I doubted that I would ever go back.
II found a fellow traveler, and tired of choosing by myself, followed him for a while.   Sometimes the road was rocky and the grass overgrazed and brown and I longed for those first two roads, both beautiful and inviting.  Only two. So easy.  I thought about the title.  It is not The Road Less Travelled.  It is The Road Not Taken.  

And so I tell my story with a sigh.  Did the poem mean a sign of regret?  Of joy?  Of frustration? If we quickly turn to see where we've been the setting sun temporarily blinds us and we see only that - the setting sun.

I chose.  We all chose.  We chose our roads without seriousness or guilt, but with every consequence.  And I continue to choose, refusing the illusion of a destination. And every time I choose it makes all the difference.

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
For 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!
Though 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 travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.