The Road Less Traveled

Today, the girls painted.  They were instructed to paint a road down the middle of their paper and fill both sides of the road with things that have happened in their lives.  As with most activities, the adults participate as well to provide direction and example.  So today, I painted.
My road was not the prettiest.  It was a dirt brown.  My pictures were vague and more symbolic than representative.  Along each side I lined my road with my strongest memories: the birth of my sister, the day I met God, the death of all four of my grandparents, the places I've visited, my transition to VFCC, etc.  As I look back at my life thus far and reflect on it, I find I've never taken the easiest road.  Most people would spend their summers watching TV and eating junk food.  I spent them overseas.  Most people would go to college within driving distance of home.  It takes me approximately 6 hours of flight and at least one layover to go back and forth.  Most people would choose to do something safe with their life.  I've chosen to make serving God in India my life.
As I look back over the course of this internship, I realize I've learned so much in such a short time.  I've rediscovered God's love for me.  I've rediscovered my love for the people of India.  I've rediscovered where my passions lie.  People say that internships change your life forever.  This one did.
Will I spend the rest of my life working with girls in a children's home?  No, that's not my strength.  Will I use art to work with survivors of horrible experiences?  Maybe, only God knows.  Will I follow wherever God leads me after this point?  Yes, because I know he sees the path where I can't see.
Robert Frost wrote a poem, which happens to be one of the few poems I actually enjoy reading and listening to.  It goes like this:

"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, 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 marked 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.

I'm taking the road less traveled...and I know that makes all the difference.