Looking back

Regrets By Trudy Kerman

Regrets always begin when I look back, over my shoulder at the might haves, would of should of, crossroads of my life. In 50 some odd years there have be a few places where I think “…I should’ve turned left at Albuquerque,” as the great Bugs Bunny would say.

Yup, plagued about once a week by the once wases and might have beens if only I’d said, done or not, this or that. Stayed in Detroit and finished my degree there for example.

Or moved to Florida with my widowed mother and gone to art school on Sana Belle Island. Me and dozens of silver haired ladies and gents.

What ever happened to that dream of becoming a parapsychologist? And what person in their right mind moves to San Francisco at 18, and then moves back; to Detroit?

Every road not taken, give up fine arts and get a degree in Journalism; marry husband # 1 but not the guy before who haunted my dreams every night for 15 years after we pushed each other away and into the arms of someone seemingly more appropriate rises up behind me and leads to a different horizon, another life for a different me.

When I find myself in head swivel mode, I’m usually running smack into some obstacle right here in the present. This path is littered with them.

I’ve not come this far on my own, having chosen companions along the way, a husband, and our children who are now nearly grown up. We are very merry travelers who’ve decided that this year we will have more fun times. We will go to the theater to watch a play, see an opera or a musical.

I think I dive into that swamp of regrets when I look at the landscape of life around me and see only the obstacles.

If I stop for just a minute on this journey and just listen, to the robins singing on my front lawn. The wind whispering the promise summer or a storm; If I just look up and see a new hue of blue or vivacious shades of green sprouting from every bush and tree; then I take a deep breath and savor this, the life I have right here. There is no other time, or place but now.