Friday Writings #42: Choices

Hello, dear wordsmiths. What have you been up to lately?

Me, I have recently completed the first draft of my prison-poetry-workshops memoir, and my mind has been running on the choices we make as we go about our lives.

Hopefully not too many of us are faced with choices which might lead us to spend time in prison!

I did, of course – though not as a prisoner. How might my life have been different if I had never done that? Would I make that choice again, knowing now how it all turned out?

I have always thought that if I do publish that memoir, I’ll preface it with a quote from Tolkien’s 'Lord of the Rings' (spoken by Aragorn): 

There are some things that it is better to begin than to refuse, even though the end may be dark.

 

(Map of Middle Earth. Image from Unsplash, by Liam Truong)

Ah, but how does one navigate all the secondary choices which follow from that first decision?

And what about the many tiny little choices in life which don’t seem momentous at the time? (No, I can’t be bothered going out for a walk today; yes I will eat that extra piece of chocolate … and oops! health problems down  the track.)

Your choices today:

1. If you would like a prompt this week, I invite you to consider a choice you made (large or small) and tell us what followed – or imagine how things might have been if you’d chosen differently, and tell us that.

Robert Frost perhaps said it once and for all, with:

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood ...

(I'm sure you know it well.)

But he didn't go into detail. I hope you do!

2. Or, if you think Frost has the last word on the subject, you may skip the prompt and treat us to any topic you – er – choose.

Poetry or prose, old or new, formal or free … prose pieces 369 words maximum, please; one post per person, and link it to us below (with the url of the particular post, not your blog as a whole).

Next week, Magaly will invite us to write about ‘toxic love’.