The Path of Most Resistance

I spent most of my time occupying various, um, administration buildings.

There is no road map for life. Ever hear that one? Of course you have. Some of us are able to avoid the statement and do what is not only expected of us, but what we expect from ourselves. I wouldn’t say most middle to high school age kids have some sort of plan to bridge the gap between their adolescence and adulthood, however you could say those who are aware enough to concoct some sort of strategy have a head start on those who don’t.

Some History*…

No matter what some will say, everyone strives for some sort of stability no matter which path you choose. It’s difficult to thrive amid chaos. I know I couldn’t. Coming out the other end of high school and my parents divorce, I had enough of the unknown. So I clung to any stability I could find. I moved back in with my mom, I got a job, had a steady girlfriend and applied to the school she was going to attend the following year.

I’ve told this story before, and if you’ve made it this far, don’t give me a hard time about this being overly self-indulgent. What do you think a blog is all about?

So to make this told story short, I did something I didn’t necessarily want to do, but it wasn’t like I didn’t want to do it either. I knew I was supposed to go to college, right? I figured this one in the rural Northwest Missouri would do. I still have no clue how my girlfriend at the time found this place, coming from Eastern South Dakota. Life just has a funny way of happening.

The abridged version is as follows. I follow this girl down to Missouri for school. I don’t do so well in school because the major I landed on was chosen because of it’s potential earning power, rather than how passionately I felt about it. But it was more the social aspect I wasn’t ready for. Living with my dad, I had no real responsibilities. It’s not that I was irresponsible, well, ok I guess I was a little, but I certainly wasn’t out of control. I was just lazy. It was something I wanted because I didn’t want to give up on the stability of who I was with. So I found myself in Maryville, Missouri. A Bearcat.

In any community, large and small, you get out to meet people. However, the one person I met in Maryville who became a big part of my life was someone I met while staying inside. Alright, very briefly… Everyone has to take a basic computer skills class. Word, Excel, Power Point and so on. Well, the final project in this class was to create a website. I decided to browse through what other students created because, well, I created a lot of downtime for myself. I only made it to the A’s.

We were internet “dating” before you had heard of eHarmony or Match.com. Pioneers, I tell you. We chatted on AIM and we had not-so-secret lunches at the union. My girlfriend at the time had spies, but I didn’t care. She, the other girl, didn’t seem to mind much either. I move home, she stays. We ended up long-distance dating the next year, however it didn’t last. It couldn’t last. I stayed with her a couple weekends, but I felt like I was chasing a life I could not have or be a part of.

And in the end…

Fast forward. Keep going. This is the point of my rambling, I suppose. For all the twists, for all the turns and dead ends, you sometimes get to find your way back. And for the last going on seven years now… here I am, and here we are. A little family. I have the two best people I could imagine in my world. Sometimes, it’s nice to make time to reflect and enjoy the thought.

*If you want the rest of the history, you can click right here. Be aware of typos and some latent writing nonsense.