When we were young I remember my cousin Ka and I shared an old briefcase full of loose papers filled with our dreams for the future.  These pages were full of scribbles, collages glued together from magazines, and stories we wrote together. 

She's in Guatemala currently embarking on her two years as a 'foot solider for compassion*' with the Peace Corps.  I am very proud of her, but at the same time I worry about her being away from family and friends in a foreign country where she may only be able to bathe once a week.  I know she is an amazingly smart and talented woman and whatever hardships that may come her way, she will be able to shoulder well.  I can't wait to see her at the end of her journey, to see how much she may have changed and hear the stories she will have to tell. 

This gets me to wondering where I will be in two years.  Some of us have known since when we were young what we wanted to be when we grow up.  Others may take a little while but if I've learned anything in my years, it's that everything happens for a reason and you should never forget to count your blessings. 

*In a send off speech from G. W. Bush

1. The Road Not Taken

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;	5
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,	10
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.	15
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.	20