Tohru Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 This is not meant to be totally serious, but the other day my husband and I were discussing how it seems we always pick the wrong choice, the least popular one. Fifteen years ago, we had a choice between 2 stocks, one was Wolrd of Warcraft Online. We didn't choose WOW, which if we had, we would be millionaires right now. Other things came up: the bank we liked went out of business, the babycarrier I preferred is no longer made, the curricula I love is out of print, my lotion preference is no longer available...the list goes on. Lots of other things like that too. Grrr. Oh yeah, taking the road less travelled (less popular opinion) sure has made all the difference! If only I could sue my 4th grade teacher and Robert Frost. For those that need a reminder: The Road Not Taken 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- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Haiku Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 Well, on the bright side, you're still married to your husband. He was a good choice, right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
katilac Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 Yes! Too funny. dh and I actually joke that earning our patronage is a sure way for any company to go out of business. If we bring out-of-town visitors to a restaurant we have discovered, we tell them, "Enjoy it, we're sure it won't be here next time." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lara in Colo Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 You cannot know the outcome of the other road-- you could be millionairs that spend all their time getting hit up for money or sued. You could have gotten divorced from something that happened. And by the way-- it says that the road "made all the difference"--- YOU assumed it was a better difference-- perhaps yes, perhaps no-- but most likely just different. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lara in Colo Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 BTW if I like something it is guaranteed to go out of business!! My endorsement is the kiss of death Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seeker of Schole Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 Do you mind a little literary analysis? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spryte Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 ...DH tried to convince me to buy Apple stock back in the 90s, when it was super cheap. I chose groceries (we were starving students, what can I say?)... Your WoW story resonates here. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tohru Posted March 31, 2014 Author Share Posted March 31, 2014 ...DH tried to convince me to buy Apple stock back in the 90s, when it was super cheap. I chose groceries (we were starving students, what can I say?)... Your WoW story resonates here. :) Oh! We could've been yacht neighbors! The company we chose went out of business...we laugh and say if we would've picked WoW, they probably would've went out of business and then there'd be less addiction, less online gaming, it was our chance to save world. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spryte Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 Oh! We could've been yacht neighbors! The company we chose went out of business...we laugh and say if we would've picked WoW, they probably would've went out of business and then there'd be less addiction, less online gaming, it was our chance to save world. Yep, in some alternate universe we're on our yachts! On the other hand, food is good, so... I'm okay with it all. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paige Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 I thought the road was only justified as the road less traveled as justification after the fact; like hindsight. So, you see it as the road less traveled, but who's to say it really was? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeannie in NJ Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 anyone remember Teletubbies? Well, many years ago, some of our extended family sent a year living in England. They called us and told us to buy stock in the company that owned Teletubbies. They said it was huge in England and they heard it was coming to America. We made a lot on that stock. But then another time, we invested $10,000 in an online company and lost it all but then after that dh went to the casino and made exactly 10,000 which we were able to buy out the lease on our car so we feel some things just go back and forth . Another time I lost a 20 dollar bill out of my pocket while out shopping and then a week later we were at the movies. We always stay for the credits so after the theatre was empty and the lights came on I found a 20 dollar bill. The road taken. I was living in Los ANgeles for 5 years and then decided to come back to Texas and live with my aunt (same age as me). She was going to Texas A and M. We had 3 roommates, one of them was dating a guy who brought his roommates over one night. One of them is now my dh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seeker of Schole Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 The Road Not Taken 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 thereHad 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- A little analysis- as shown by the bolded lines, the two paths were worn - or used - the same; and no one had taken either path yet that morning. Frost then says that in the future when he is telling this he will say he took the one less traveled, despite both paths having been equally traveled. Each path is really what you make of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cindy in FL. Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 I try not to like tv shows, because if I do they get cancelled. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caroline Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 I try not to like tv shows, because if I do they get cancelled. :) Me, too! :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tammi K Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 But, it works both ways, right? I had tickets for the PanAm flight the went down over Lockerbie. I didn't want to fly PanAm but it was the gov. rate carrier for where we were stationed. I wanted to fly Lufthansa - more expensive but they treated their customers better- but they had no seat. By a fluke, or the grace of God, a day before the flight I got a call from the travel agent saying there was a cancellation. I went down and exchanged my tickets. (This was back in the 'old days' of paper tickets) I flew home from Germany with two little kids on the Lufthansa flight at a loss of several hundred dollars out-of-pocket but we all know how the other flight ended. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G5052 Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 Yes, it works both ways. I had friends who went to work for Silicon Valley start-ups after college. Some of them showed up at work after a year or two on the job to find a locked building with a sign that the company had gone out of business. This happened multiple times to people I knew who were extremely talented. They often were paid partially in stock options. Others went with "small" companies like Yahoo and Netscape, and became millionaires. Thankfully they moved on and kept their wealth before those companies began to fall. Others followed more conservative paths with companies like HP and IBM, and are still there. I went to work for a university and did fine, but nothing like my Silicon Valley friends. Different paths, indeed... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mama Geek Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 There are risks and pros and cons to everything. Some things work out well and some things don't. We really take a road less travelled and sometimes it can be really aggravating like when the bank puts a hold on your credit card while you are at the grocery store and not in your home state, but there are other times that dh gets to take months off at a time in between jobs. We waited to have children. I had more than a 10 year career in white collar jobs. I will now probably only have 1 child instead of a house full because of that decision. The good is I can now stay home with her while we have no debt and we can do lots of things like me homeschooling, taking dd to dance classes and music classes and hopefully with in the next couple of years we will buy a sailboat to live on where we can cruise part time and live on while dh is working. Would I do some things differently if I had it to do over again probably, but then I might not have my wonderful little girl and a dh whom I have been married to for almost 20 years and who is still my best friend. I wouldn't want to give either of those up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs Mungo Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 You are reading this poem all wrong. The poem is written in a young man's voice ("I shall be telling this with a sigh/Somewhere ages and ages hence"), but Frost wasn't young when he wrote this. In fact, he finished it after WW1, and it was written about a friend who was killed during the war. You'll note the "though as for that the passing there/Had worn them really about the same." He says something like this at three different points in the poem. The paths *are the same*. What is different is his attitude. This poem is a facetious take on *how people see* their choices, not the choices themselves. Frost is saying that we have to make choices, but we can't predict how those choices will wind up and all choices are equally good or bad. He's saying that we don't have as big of an impact as we think we do. We're not special snowflakes. Our choices matter less than how we deal with the outcome. You're doing exactly what Frost is advising against, regretting your choices and not appreciating them for having brought you to the moment where you are now and appreciating the beauty you actually saw and see now, rather than the things you missed. Frost spent the years 1912 to 1915 in England, where among his acquaintances was the writer Edward Thomas. Thomas and Frost became close friends and took many walks together. After Frost had returned to New Hampshire in 1915, he sent Thomas an advance copy of "The Road Not Taken". The poem was intended by Frost as a gentle mocking of indecision, particularly the indecision that Thomas had shown on their many walks together. However, Frost later expressed chagrin that most audiences took the poem more seriously than he had intended; in particular, Thomas took it seriously and personally, and it provided the last straw in Thomas' decision to enlist in World War I. Thomas was killed two years later in the Battle of Arras.Repeatedly Thomas would choose a route which might enable him to show his American friend a rare plant or a special vista; but it often happened that before the end of such a walk Thomas would regret the choice he had made and would sigh over what he might have shown Frost if they had taken a "better" direction. More than once, on such occasions, the New Englander had teased his Welsh-English friend for those wasted regrets. . . . Frost found something quaintly romantic in sighing over what might have been. Such a course of action was a road never taken by Frost, a road he had been taught to avoid. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
livetoread Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 We had some Apple stock and sold it for a small loss to offset some gains that year. We were planning on buying it again at around $19 (about what we sold it for), but it shot all the way to $25, so we passed. Sob. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs Mungo Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 A little analysis- as shown by the bolded lines, the two paths were worn - or used - the same; and no one had taken either path yet that morning. Frost then says that in the future when he is telling this he will say he took the one less traveled, despite both paths having been equally traveled. Each path is really what you make of it.Sorry, I was typing as you posted this shorter version. I agree. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JennyD Posted April 1, 2014 Share Posted April 1, 2014 But, it works both ways, right? I had tickets for the PanAm flight the went down over Lockerbie. I didn't want to fly PanAm but it was the gov. rate carrier for where we were stationed. I wanted to fly Lufthansa - more expensive but they treated their customers better- but they had no seat. By a fluke, or the grace of God, a day before the flight I got a call from the travel agent saying there was a cancellation. I went down and exchanged my tickets. (This was back in the 'old days' of paper tickets) I flew home from Germany with two little kids on the Lufthansa flight at a loss of several hundred dollars out-of-pocket but we all know how the other flight ended. Wow. That's some story. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Catwoman Posted April 1, 2014 Share Posted April 1, 2014 Oh! We could've been yacht neighbors! The company we chose went out of business...we laugh and say if we would've picked WoW, they probably would've went out of business and then there'd be less addiction, less online gaming, it was our chance to save world. Or you could have been multi-millionaires whose private jet crashed on the way to your glamorous vacation. ;) I think we've all made choices that we have later questioned or regretted, but I always figure that if we're still here to talk about it and we're still feeling pretty well, we came out just fine in the end. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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