Phot by (my Dad) Dr. Robert M. Rogers
Most of my life, I’ve felt like I was forced to take the scenic route.
Where a normal human might be able to get from figurative point A to figurative point B in a few steps, I, because of all my mistakes and bad choices, take a lot longer.
And I can see that "other me", in my mind, the one who doesn’t realize he forgot his wallet a block from the store and going back home to get it doesn’t take twice as long as it did to get me almost to the store in the first place, and every slow driver and spontaneous traffic jam on the way home doesn’t make me madder and madder.
If I see on a map that my final destination is a mile away, as the crow flies, but the only road to get there is a winding, treacherous, 10-mile hike, I find it hard not to focus on the “if only”. If only I could just walk a mile directly there and save all that aggravation and time.
Maybe it was all the comics I read when I was younger and their stories of “alternate universes”. I believe my “other me” is not just a possibility, but a fact. In all the possibilities of me, I am currently living out the one life where I am incapable of making a correct decision. And for some inexplicable reason I have a front row seat for the “other me” to see where I could have done it better, easier, or just right.
The truth is...
The “other me” is fiction.
It seems real, but it is a figment.
An imaginary friend from hell.
The truth is...
Life is the Scenic Route. There is no better, faster, or more efficient way. There just is the way you are going.
In my mind, my cynical me says, “Barf! You hippie freak.”
I can also hear my critical older brother, in my head, laughing at the sheer corny, simplification of it all.
But he still laughs when he farts.
