The Road Not Taken

One of the most misunderstood poems is Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken.” We read it as a tale about individuality, independence, “taking the road less traveled.” But, that’s not what it is about.

Here are the key passages:

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.

According to the poem, “And both that morning equally lay.” No one path was “less traveled” than the other. In fact, as an undergraduate, I learned and read that Frost had a walking buddy who would often choose one path or another, and then, he would spend the time lamenting not being able to walk both, wondering if he had made the “right” choice.

“The Road Not Taken” is about rationalization. It is about the choices we make in life, and how, often, in order to make peace with those choices, we tell ourselves—“I took the one less traveled by,/And that has made all the difference.”

Last night, I experienced small town Iowa. I went with a friend to the town (village?) of Jewell. I don’t know what the population is in Jewell, but it is the typical Midwestern small town.

On the main street, they had a memorial library with a cut out of Big Bird in the window. There was a bar called the Malibu Lounge—a name I have to applaud, considering Jewell and Malibu don’t exactly seem like sister cities. The stale smell of smoke seeped from the opened screen windows, and when my friend and I stepped inside, all of the patrons were huddled around the bar, laughing, talking. This seemed a typical Saturday night ritual, and when we walked in, we were definitely the “stars of the show.” All of the patrons turned their attention to us. It felt like a movie. I could not hide my large smile. This has been one of my favorite Iowa experiences of all-time.

We were actually looking for food, so we asked for where we could eat and were directed down the street. Of course, it wouldn’t be “across town,” or maybe it was. But, as with so many small towns in America, Main Street was where most things were located, and it was hopping on a Saturday night.

Down the street was a nice restaurant. On the wall, they still had a huge placard with the 1965’s high school ladies’, I think, basketball tournament. The sense of pride was strong, even as the white had faded yellow and dust grayed the edges.

I could not decide if they were trying to mimic the chain restaurants like Applebee’s or Cracker Barrel with their “diner” and “down home” décor. Instead, I think the big chains were trying to evoke the feelings that Michelle’s simply already possessed. Knotty wooden booths felt more like bark than a seat. Still, it was comfortable enough to enjoy my $5 hamburger and fries.

Finally, we went down to the bowling alley. It seemed like an old bank from the outside—stern, reverent brick. On the inside, though, we found about eight lanes, a bar area which was just as large as the bowling alley, and bowling prices so low, I wondered if we had stumbled into a time warp.

And, here is where my blog really starts. The people we met were surrounded by the swirling energy of at least two children each. Some couples had brought in more. In any event, the number of children was more than that of the adults.

The people I spoke with had been born and raised in Iowa. They were living not far from the town where they grew up. In some cases, they still lived in their hometowns. I sat there, fascinated to hear about their daily lives and pursuits. These were truly the backbone of Iowa. They carry on its traditions, its culture, the strength of what Iowa is.

I felt so much younger than the women with whom I spoke. In some cases, I felt several years younger.

I was their age.

I imagined that these couples probably married in their early twenties, as it often seems the case in Iowa. They had three or four children. They go to church each Sunday. And for the last decade, they have supported their husbands, children, and put their own lives and ambitions on hold. These are the women who made The Bridges of Madison Country a run-away bestseller.

These women are the same age that I am. I tried to put myself in their shoes. How must that feel?

How often do you drive through small towns and wonder what it must be like to live there? Not drive through but walk down that main street, no longer than probably ten or fifteen buildings, and see the familiar comfort of home.

When I was little, well, and probably now, too, sometimes, I would walk or drive through a place late at night and glance into people’s open curtains and see the flicker of their television sets. I tried to imagine another life. I tried to imagine what it must be like to be sitting in that room, watching that television, and I would wonder what thoughts the person was having.

Last night, I was reminded of Robert Frost’s poem.

Those women probably looked me, too, and saw a parallel life. One that did not include marriage or children. One with slightly fewer worry lines (and maybe even laugh lines). I could do as I wanted, when I wanted, and with whom I wanted.

I might’ve folded my arms and told myself that I “took the road less traveled.” I did not envy those women. I truly believe that if I had wanted to have a husband and children, I would’ve made those choices in life. But, I simply didn’t.

And, yet, I didn’t blaze any trails or do anything individualistic or empowering. They didn’t choose the path of the most contentment and satisfaction, either, I’m sure of it. We simply made choices.

We rationalize our choices. We have to. We don’t get to hit the “reset” button on life. There are no do-overs. You make a choice, and it has ramifications.

I like to say that “the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence…until you have to mow it.”

We choose our paths. The point is to enjoy the path we’re walking because once we make a choice, we can’t go back and walk the other.

So, inhale the fresh air and enjoy your path—at least we’re still walking and we can savor the sweet anticipation of the next fork in the road.

Homelessness

On the streets of downtown San Francisco, mostly men wrapped themselves in tattered coats and blankets, and sleep on collapsed cardboard boxes—a cold, hard sleep. They wrapped themselves so tightly, all dreams seemed tucked inside their empty pockets.

I stepped over the puddles of their urine, ignored the undeniable smell of their humanity, discarded, too disheartening to acknowledge. These men, mostly men, lacked a house. I cannot call them homeless.

What is home? Is it the place where we keep our stuff? Is it the place where I press my head to pillow and experience the night’s restless “out of body” dream life? Is it where my parents live?

I am homeless.

My childhood home, where my parents still live, does not feel like “home” anymore. I go back, but I feel the tensions beneath the surface. Holidays are difficult. My parents, perhaps, wanting to recapture the innocence of that space before they lost a son and felt their daughter slip from their hands—or maybe fists, confess to a deep sadness that I do not stay at their house, do not sleep in my old bed, do not retread the old, creaky memories of a home broken and dilapidated by grievances, loss, and intolerance. The wooden floors were not built for such burdens that we carry now. I am not the daughter they hoped for—no going back can erase the years of emails and deep sighs and regret. I am not the person I thought I’d be when I grew up. They are not the parents I thought they would be when I grew up. We disappoint each other. Home is not home anymore.

The apartment where I live and work is not my home. This is where I live. I keep things packed up in boxes, a sleight of hand meant to trick my heart into believing that a home might still be found.

I do not know where home is or what it feels like. Sometimes, when I am with someone, my heart swells, and I think, is this love, or does that tickle of warmth to my cold heart deceive me?

I come from pilgrims. The first pilgrim child born in the New World was Peregrine White. My family claims to share his blood. Perhaps this is why I have moved every two years for the last eight years. It is simply not in my DNA to be “at home” anywhere—at least for long.

I thought I had a home once. The time I spent in Findlay, Ohio in a small house on a modest street felt as much like home as anything ever has. Maybe “home” cannot be sustained.

We define home with words like belong, harmony, warmth, safety, comfort, love, sweetness, the place where we keep our hearts…

I am homeless.

The men on the streets of San Francisco would wake and begin a day of walking, wandering, asking the tourists and passersby for change or cigarettes. Maybe they would get enough money and goodwill to survive another day. I admire their unbreakable will to survive. Life may be bleak, but they will tenaciously wake each morning. I have a brother who could not do that. There are few people I respect as much as those who seemingly have little to live for, who could lay down on those streets and fade into the warm embrace of Death, but, world, Fate, maybe even God, be damned, those men rise from those spots each morning, and they will survive another day. Is this the audacity of hope?

Maybe I, too, beg for change—not coins, not anyone’s spare change—but a place to change my perception of home. Is it something in the future?

I do not believe I have had a home now for several years. And, yet, I am homesick for a place that no longer exists. I cannot go back. The emotional space within me—which might be home—has been broken.

I am thankful for my apartment, for the bed where I sleep. Anyone of us could so easily find ourselves without these walls to keep us safe and warm.

As I sit here, I wonder if those men, mostly men, in San Francisco were as homeless as I feel.

Somehow, though they begged me for food and change, I feel as though I might be the one who received something from them that I never realized I was asking for.

The Murderer of Minutes

The blood stains my fingertips, drips like hot wax down my arms. My breath quickens. Pupils dilate. Here I sit, ready to confess my crime.

I am the murderer of minutes.

Have you ever noticed how easy it is to “kill” Time? Life feels like a giant waiting room, each of us leafing through our distractions until we are finally called to the back.

I work, go to school, run errands—deepening the rut I must carve so as not to notice that I am stalking my own demise.

Each little murdered minute decays and fades, never to be recaptured, condemned to haunt me in my dreams and memories. The precious little clock ticks are the echoes of ghosts, lost as soon as they are born.

Oh, if only I had….I should’ve….Why didn’t I….The phrase “remember the time” serves as a granite headstone to these passing moments and together we huddle around it, offering each other the comfort of our shared grief.

I am trapped inside Time. Is it a web? A cage? An illusion?

Who invented Time? I want to dismantle this construction and the way it dictates my movements through space and existence.

How different would life be without having to know that you just killed an hour?

But, it is murder. And I am guilty. Each wasted hour, minute, second is one less I’ll ever have. I’m murdering myself each time I stare at a wall, each time I don’t do what it is I want to do.

The time has come to stop sitting still at stoplights.

A Novel Beginning

Call me I, and this is the story of my life. I am you. I am me. I am everyone. Perhaps this is not my story at all, but everyone's story. I can only claim my small part. Let me explain who I am and why I write to you.

Many people these days do not read books. Oh, we still read--emails, news, each other (in the form of blogs). Maybe we pick up a magazine now and then. But, nothing has the same energy and pulse as an updated blog. We read the date and scan the page, excited by the words that have recently sprung from the mind of a blogger.

Blogs are essentially narssistic. I talk about me. I contemplate my life and ponder my existence. I wonder why I am here, why love is love, why the sky is blue, and I read my blog over and smile with satisfaction. Then, I read someone else's blog. I am everywhere these days.

It was bound to happen, right? Novels have always been a humanistic artform, interested in the dramatics of the individual human life. We have college courses where we dissect the voices in a given novel. Who speaks? Who does not? Who is marginalized? Silenced?

These days, we have fewer novels and fewer people reading them for the simple reason that we have internalized the narrator. Novels come in three parts, the trinity of storytelling: author, narrator, character. In blogs, the author and narrator completely collapse, and we become our own characters. Our lives suddenly seem more dramatic and purposeful. We begin moving through our day, hearing a voice narrate our lives ("this would be a good thing to post on my blog," we think).

Yet, the minute we write our thoughts and experiences down, they become less "true"--like a dream we try to retell, often filling in the gaps with overthinking and analysis. We censor, edit, and try to give "order" to the events. Blogs do the same.

And, why do we read each other's blogs? Do I really care about my friend's latest date? Or, my friend's philosophy regarding different brands of dog food? The answer is simple: I read these blogs to validate myself. In the movie Shadowlands, one of the characters says, "We read to know we're not alone." These days, it seems, we read and write blogs because we are alone. Or, at least, maybe we like to think we are--unique, endowed with a special perspective on the world.

Blogging seems to be an attempt to make meaning out of our lives, to find what has been sucked away by television and movies, turning us into even more ferocious voyeurs. And, stalkers. We can peek through the curtains of this cyber-window and blogs throw the curtain open. Blogs confirm what I have long believed: writers are closet exhibitionists. These days everybody is a writer and the Internet is a big closet.

Years from now, in college courses, perhaps the question will be asked: who is the greatest literary figure of the 21st century? The answer now becomes--"I." I now read my own life, create a narrative from the banality of doing laundry or mowing my lawn or choosing between brands of tampons.

Blogs allow us to do what novels are no longer capable of. We do not read and identify with the heroes. We do not vicariously read a novel and apply it to our own existences. These days, we are the heroes we read. Blogs give the semblance of control and meaning. If I was cut off in traffic, no problem, I will blog about it and it will be come a lesson in tolerance. If I got my oil changed, it is a diversion as I think about describing the way the mechanic smelled of hot grease and Camels and how oil changes are metaphoric for how we all need a change now and then to run more smoothly.

So, here is chapter one of my novel blog. Call me I. Call you I. We are all I. And, I am these words. A character to revival any of Austen's fine heroines, Hemingway's drunks, or the Bronte's dark and brooding lovers. But, while those are condemned to leather-bound prisons with their imaginary lives withering among the dusty, yellowing pages, I throb with the promise of flesh and blood. I am hot with life.

Who is the greatest literary figure of the 21st century?

I am.