While I was in Texas, I asked my family one simple question. I asked each family member, if they could go back in time to their younger selves without any repercussions or time paradoxes or anything like that, what would they change?
At first the question brought on this look of utter bafflement. As if I was a crazy person. That would be impossible, I can't go back in time and change anything. What is now, is what is. You can't change the past. My response was but what, if you could?
I asked them to imagine they could have anything they wanted...to be their younger selves again...To know what they know now....To know this future and everything that has happened....What would they change? Who would they become now.
My Aunt said that she had always wanted to go to college in Hawaii. She told me that she would have gone to college instead of marriage and family right away and majored in Psychology and became a Psychologist. Her focus would have been troubled children.
I thought that was amazing. She had helped me through a few troubled times in my life, knocked me around and set me straight at exactly the right time. The most perfect re-do ever for someone who spent her life doing what she hated to make ends meet and feeling that she was less of a mother because she had to work instead of staying home with her children.
We talked late into the night that night about what she could do to make her dream come true. She thought maybe she could volunteer at a home for troubled teens. What a wonderful idea my aunt has, I can see her now, her special way with young people. If she only knew, how really amazing she is with the young. What a good mentor she would be.
My Uncle was a little tougher to get to visualize a life other than what he had right now. Finally, he went there. He said that he would love a life were he could work with electronics and his wood work. He said that he would have also waited to start a family and marriage. Waited until he grew up some and established himself.
I looked into his light blue Danish eyes and found such wisdom there. I have always thought so highly of my uncle. He is a very talented woodworker and makes the most beautiful furniture I have ever seen. He might be one of the gruffest men around, yet there is something so gentle about him. If you could see the love in his eyes when he looks at my aunt or his grandchildren, you would know that this is a good man.
My cousin has lived his life as a drug addict. I am not sure why he chose to do this to himself. I am not sure why anyone chooses this life. Yet, my drug of choice is chocolate. However, I have never been in jail for my addiction, just fat. He has ruined his brain and his life for drugs.
At first, my aunt wanted to answer for him. I think that she is so used to trying to save him or protect him that she felt he could not answer this question. I asked her to let him answer. I told my cousin that I knew he was a good man with a good heart just very troubled and kinda stupid with his life choices. He finally answered me.
He told me that he would have never started drugs in the first place or ever drank, smoked...not once. He said that he would have been an artist or the person that makes the masks in Hollywood. I am not sure what that person is called. Maybe a makeup artist?
My heart was filled with hope and sad for him all at the same time. I wished that there was a place he could go for one or two years that he could rehabilitate himself once and for all and get the help he really needed. That there would be no way he could leave, no drugs, no smoking, no alcohol and lots and lots of therapy. Other than jail or a place that costs hundreds of thousands dollars that no one would ever spend for an aging junkie. I don't think he will ever get that chance. That is our world today. We spend millions on the bullet trains going to no place, yet we won't spend a dime on our own.
My cousin and I spent time talking about our youth and how we were inseparable. There are no memories without him and my other two cousins that are worth having. If I could have one wish, it would be that he would be able to be free of his addiction and live in peace. Yet, there are no wishes granted in this life, not here anyway.
I felt that I got to know my people a little bit better this trip. I know, I get a bit introspective and some people do not like to get carried into that journey with me or ever at all. They like the flat surface of the here and now. The constant barrage of the TV glaring, Celebrity news and reality shows and the smart phone in their face. Those things are interesting but so not what life is all about.
I love to delve into what makes people really tick. What is it that makes you who you are? Why are you like this? Why am I like me? What makes us be friends and why are we family? What do you think? Tell me your dreams. Let me tell you mine. This to me is interesting and intriguing.
Why do you think? Should I finally let go and just be like everyone else with my favorite reality shows and a love affair with my phone? Or, should I continue of my journey of getting to know everyone for who they really are?
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