"The Road NOT Taken"

THE ROAD NOT TAKEN
By Robert Frost

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.

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This was a poem I recited in my senior year in high school. I chose it as an oratorical piece because it was so relevant in my life. I had always been someone who ran against the grain and in all conscious non-conformity, I always stood alone. I was a stickler for rules when obviously everyone wasn’t and I was lax when doctrines came a-knockin’.

There is a price to pay for being different but I always found someone who understood what it meant to be different.

I had matured beyond my years through the many trials and travels in my life. I had not been appreciated by my peers till I went to the university. I was always the “odd one out.” But I never regretted the decision of taking the “road not taken” because in choosing that path, I had become the person that I am.

It was the pain of loneliness, the pain of being different, and the pain of self-sacrifice that drove me past the un-trodden path. But as I travel on that “road less traveled” I find one or two taking up their burdens for what seems to be a reward awaiting the end of such a grueling journey.

I guess I am also searching for that reward of being different, of being less mediocre than the pack, and of knowing that being me is a good thing. But I am not banking on that. I wanted to be different because it’s what I thought would make me happy. And I am happy now.