Retracing His Steps

A journey leading back to the present

As soon as he got home to his hovel he began building a fire in the fireplace. After walking three miles through a blizzard it would have been nice to come home to warmth but it would be some time before the hovel was warm enough for him to take off his coat. Once the fire was raging he pulled a chair from his small table and set it directly in front of the fire. With his coat and hat and scarf still on he sat down and stared into the fire.

Shivering from the cold, he contemplated the wretched condition of his life. He began retracing the events of his life searching for that one bad decision he must have made that led to his current condition. Traveling backwards in time he returned to all the forks in the road that he had come upon. He quickly realized that there were countless forks and it seemed that with every fork he had veered off onto the wrong path. And every bad decision led to an endless string of further bad decisions.

He kept going backwards through all those forks looking for the one big fork that sent him on the path to subsequent forks and bad decisions; the one big fork that ruined his life. But with each fork in the road he went back to, he realized there was another fork before that at which he made a wrong turn. He wondered how far back he would have to go to find that one big fork at which he chose a direction that led to his state of profound misery.

He realized that there were actually a small handful of forks in the road at which he made a good decision and headed in a fruitful direction but those few good decisions were always followed by bad decisions leading him away from whatever joy he had turned towards.

He retraced every major decision he had made in his life, including decisions about employment and occupation, education, where he wanted to live, what passions he would nurture, what friends he would keep close, and the close intimate relationships he had entered into. It seemed that almost every single decision he had ever made had been the wrong one.

Why did he move to this frigid countryside instead of moving to where palm trees grow? Why did he quit that one job where he was actually well-paid? Why did he choose writing over music? Over art? Why did he choose poverty over wealth? Why did he drop out of college? Why did he choose solitude over a large social network of friends? Why did he choose marriage; not once but twice? Why did he choose to release all his lovers rather than fight to hold on to those relationships? Why did he release all his friends? Why did he turn his back on family? Why did he choose to be so confrontational as a child? Why did he choose to be different from everyone else?

If only he could go back and change just one of those many decisions how profoundly different would his life be now?

As the warmth from the fire slowly heated the hovel he finally stopped shivering. His muscles were sore from all the shivering. He unzipped his coat but kept it on. He took off his scarf and threw it over onto the little table. Standing, he turned to walk over to the window.

With his first step an excruciating pain exploded from his left ankle. He immediately stopped moving to let the pain recede. He then proceeded very carefully and slowly to the window, taking short and gentle steps so as not to stress the swollen ankle.

At the window he pulled open the curtain to see a beautiful and tranquil scene of very large snowflakes falling down through the still and frigid air. The snow was coming down so thickly that he could barely see the trees down by the creek. Looking to the side at the very small tree growing next to the hovel, he saw a lone songbird sitting motionless on a branch. He had always wondered where all the birds went during a storm. This little bird was just waiting out the storm sitting on a barely sheltered tree branch. He realized that he was like that bird; waiting out blizzard after blizzard after blizzard.

Turning his gaze back towards the full wintry scene, his spirits rose just a bit. It truly was a beautiful scene despite the underlying bleakness.

He realized that retracing his history was utterly futile. It was impossible to go back and change a past decision and change the trajectory of his life. The burden of his regret lifted slightly with this thought.

Then he thought about the future and his spirits once again sank knowing that he had very little of it left. Surely there would not be many forks in the road before the final big one.

And then he noticed a lone deer stepping out of the brush at the edge of the field of snow-covered grass. The deer walked slowly across the field towards the creek. Halfway across the field the deer stopped in its track. After a moment of stillness, the deer turned its head and looked directly at him. Maybe the deer was just looking at the hovel but he felt that the deer was looking directly at him standing in the window. As the deer stared at him, he stared at the deer. Finally, after a very long moment, the deer turned to face forward and it resumed its walk towards the creek. His gaze followed the deer until it was out of sight.

The past and future evaporated. The deer brought him immediately into the present. He was abruptly filled with joy. A soothing warmth spread throughout his body. His mind became light and free.

What he did not realize as he stared out the window was that he was looking at a fork in the road. He did not realize that a decision awaited him that could bring him great joy and happiness. He did not fully understand that joy was a decision that he could make in every moment of the present. He felt it and was on the verge of making that decision.

Turning away from the window, he walked slowly and carefully back to the fire. After putting more wood on the fire he took off his hat and flung it across the room towards the hat rack on the wall. He missed and the hat fell to the floor. He then picked up the chair and carefully walked it back to the table. He then went into the tiny kitchen and filled his teapot with water, putting it on the stove to heat up. After getting a mug and teabag out of the little cabinet he set them on the counter and then took off his coat.

Slowly he walked to the coat rack on the wall below the hat rack. Placing the coat on the rack he then painfully bent over to pick up the hat and place it on the hat rack.

It was not long before the teapot began whistling. Going back to the little kitchen he poured the hot water into the mug then carried his tea to the little table where he turned on his electric typewriter.