Begin Again

same roads

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;

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,

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.

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.

- Robert Frost

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fun fact the above poem actually doesn't discuss taking your own individual path, aka the one less traveled by because you decided to not be a follower! it actually means that hey these roads are the same and when you're older you'll be telling yourself it's made a difference but it didn't! I was lied too all my life.

______________________

Louis was 19 years old and his girlfriend of two years was holding out the light pink stick with a visible positive sign on the front. He saw her mouth move and he heard her voice but neither lined up, she dropped the stick and Louis watched it fall to the floor which was his cluttered room.

He felt his heart pick up speed and he could feel the rush of his blood, as everything around him appeared to move slower. His girlfriend slapped him on the arm, "what do you want to do?" She demanded.

See, the thing is Louis thought he was ready. He'd grown up raising his siblings for the past 12 years, he felt like this was something he could do. "What do you mean me?" He asked.

She rolled her eyes, "are we keeping it?" She asked. It. She referred to their child as an it.

"Of course we are!" Louis said.

She sighed heavily, "I have college, and we don't have jobs, and I am just too broke for this right now Lou," her voice got more broken towards the end.

"Hey, we got this, the two of us, side by side," he grabbed her hands and looked into her warm green eyes, "we will be okay," he smiled gently, and he saw her lips quiver upwards in a small smile. "You are everything to me," he continued, "both of you," and he wrapped his arms around her in a tight hug.

"Okay, Lou, we can do this," she kissed him on the cheek and he smiled into her dark brown wavy hair.

It was all going to be okay.

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A few weeks later

The day Louis told his father and stepmother that his girlfriend was pregnant, it did not go as planned. They sat across from him and neither talked for several minutes. Louis only waited patiently for their response.