What If...

I often wonder what the tipping point would have been. How far back should I go to change everything? Would I just go away to school in spite of the havoc that became my life post accident or would I just wish away the accident. So lets go with the latter and say the accident never happened.

So for that is where I will start, I will go back to that late day in March on my way to develop spring break photos. Driving down a familiar road and only this time there is no cyclist and I make it to the store, get my pics developed and head back to my friends to show them off.

It seems easy enough. Then I get exactly what I always wanted the opportunity to leave for college. 

Only my parents never wanted me to leave, the accident just gave them a legitimate reason to get me to stay. They never would have been okay with me moving 2000 miles away. So we would come to a compromise and I would be allowed to leave the area, but not the state and I would go to my first choice state school. The school of choice would put me far enough away from them, but still close to family so that I would not really be alone. 

This is where it get interesting, I applied for this school several months prior to graduating high school, not for anyone else, but because it had a variety of degrees I was interested in. If I had gone to that college I would have been at the same university at the same time as my now husband. My husband and I met online 500 miles away from each other. So it could have been  easier or nearly impossible to have met him on a large university campus. Truth be told I don't think our paths would have ever crossed. His political activism has rubbed off on me now, but back then I could have cared less. I would have been focused on my own life and getting myself situated. Maybe if we were destined the universe would have thrown us together, but it seems so unlikely. 

One more important factor is, coincidentally the boy from high school who I was hopelessly infatuated with just happened to be attending the same university as my future husband. So who is to say how that would have turned out. 

I am still trying to figure out if I believe in destiny and fate. I believe in God and I believe in choices. I think God has a plan for our lives, but I also believe we make our own choices that determine how we get through our journey on Earth.

So right then and there if one event had failed to occur in my life I may never have met my husband. An event occurred that was out of my control when I was 18, but I made the decision to stay here. In the months that followed the accident I decided it was best for me to stay put.