Choices

Every day we make choices. Many are important, some are not, and all create a winding path through life on which we journey. We can spend too much time on the hard ones and too little time on the ones envisioned as easy. We watch and think and act. We rejoice and regret and reconsider. We allow winds of change to swirl among the seasons of time passing through and by each of us.

We stand amidst some choices falling gentle and pure as snowflakes. Tranquilized by beauty, it goes unnoticed that drifts obstruct the view, ice forms underfoot, and we are lost. Fearing a repeat event, we next stay inside, paralyzed before warm fireplaces, never venturing out again. We cling to other choices like trees, rooted in strength, hanging tight to unfurled leaves waving strong against a vivid sky. We celebrate other choices and revel in the explosive glory crimsoned in autumn colors. And then there are the choices seeded in ancient seasons. Budding in spring and tenderly pushing through vestiges of winter’s snow, their results bloom and surprise.

We can choose more than what to wear, when to eat and whether or not to exercise. We can alter and shape destinies. With our thoughts and actions building upon days and forming years, friends, and families, we create a life built upon our choices. We create a life that one day will be left as a legacy and remembered in captured moments.

So let us choose to be kinder today than yesterday and offer help to the hopeless. Let us choose to love those who live in the past and show them how to live in the present. Let us choose to laugh at ourselves, share of ourselves, and care for others. Let us choose who we want to be and how to become that person.

Let us choose wisely.