The Path I Chose

A lot can happen in a day. Even in the span of minute’s one can see if they made a correct path choice from their early youth.

While I was working in one store, at separate times, I met two people I went to high school with. One person I met by his smell and appearance looked like he just got out of bed. It was well in the afternoon but dressed like he just came from the gym even though it was apparent that he never set foot in one to begin with. In school he was cocky, upper class attitude of being better than anyone while tormenting those he deemed the bottom of society. Now he looked like he’s on hard times whether it be alcohol or drugs and making due with whatever he can to get by.

The second person I met was a bit surprising for me. In school I remember her as the one to make it all the way. She had great grades and was able to get into any college she wanted. Smart and likable in school but when I saw her I did a long double take. At first I didn’t recognize her but as we talked for a while I learned that all her dreams died or changed considerably because she and her boyfriend didn’t have protection from getting pregnant.

She couldn’t handle going to college and taking care of her baby so she gave up school, stayed with her parents while making the best she could do with a part time job. Eventually she married but she also had acquired government assistance in food stamps and medical coverage. I was surprised she had gained a lot of weight for she was very skinny in school. Now she looked like a complete different person.

What worked for me in school may not work for others. But I survived the bullying and being looked down by others as someone most likely to be forgotten. Most of those I went to school with did accomplish a lot in their life while other didn’t. I chose to not care about being in the different schools class societies such as: the jocks, nerds etc... I chose to instead to get through school by watching from the sidelines. Still bullied a lot and treated like an outcast but I survived.

Many former classmates have died since graduation due to drugs, alcohol and other vices but what surprises a lot of former classmates is that I’m still alive. And that I have been very active at that. Visited and lived in many different countries, almost arrested or killed several times as well as traveling across the country many times while meeting and experiencing many people and their cultures.  Most people who knew me have never journeyed at least 100 miles from their home or even went someplace outside the state of North Carolina.

That day I saw the path I chose to take in school as a justifiable one for me. It was a difficult one at the time but it ended up making me stronger. More prepared for the harshness that life after school was and did offer. I could have tried to be with the in-crowd and faked all those usual attitudes that people have in those groups. But I never could fake on who I really was, even though at the time I didn’t fully know my potential. But in the present day, after meeting those two, I believed that the choice I made a long time ago worked.