Past, Present, and Future

Sometimes I look back and wonder where I would be if I had made some big decisions differently. There were many times when I could've chosen to stop being Homeschooled and instead could've gone into the public school system. I could have moved away from home early like my brother, but decided not to. I remember that time both clearly and strangely with difficulty. It's like looking at a broken mirror, it still reflects images clearly but it's hard to make sense of what you see. I do remember shaking my brother's hand at the bus station just before he boarded his bus north, then crying softly in the car on the way home. That was one of the few times I have cried in the last several years; I never realized how much it would bother me not having my brother around. But I don't regret the decision to stay, it was the right one for me, just as it was right for him to go.

My memory comes in bits and pieces. There are times when one family member or other will reference something that happened and I will have no memory of it whatsoever. It's easy to feel bad, guilty, or even pity myself when that happens. But I figure there must be a reason why I don't remember, and there are plenty of things I remember that part of me would rather not - the most difficult times of my life for instance which I rarely talk about. I'm starting to sound like a veteran of some brutal war or something, but really my life probably isn't much different than the lives of others.

I don't regret many decisions I've made, and I'm pretty happy with the way things are going now. It's looking like I'll finally be home in a place that won't be such a struggle to maintain or as stressing to live in as it was out in the country, though part of me will always miss the open landscapes and sense of peace and freedom only found there. I'm probably going to graduate next year with enough duel credit hours to skip a year of college. I'll be a year ahead of schedule, which most likely wouldn't be the case had I chosen to go back to public school.

I'm still not sure what I'm going to with my life though. I've narrowed down the options somewhat, though honestly the most fun ones are not really feasible. I'm most likely going to double major in History and English, but I don't know what I'll do after I get out of college. I've always wanted to get at least a Master's degree but I don't have a way to pay for that yet. Where ever I go in life, I hope that I can look back at this time and not regret any major decisions I will be making in the next couple of years. I want to live without regrets, and have some fun along the way. There is something I said to a friend once, "Remember the past but dwell in the present, while stepping boldly into the future." I hope I can live my life that way.