Changing the Past

If I could change my past then who would I be today? I am who I am today because of everything in the past. All my experiences are mine, and whoever I shared them with. Whether they are good, bad, happy or sad; it doesn't matter!

If my mother hadn't died when I was three, I would know how to speak three languages. I wouldn't have been raised by my grandmother. I wouldn't know all the people that I know. I wouldn't have lived by the lake and swam at the beach everyday in the summer. I wouldn't have known how to drive a snowmobile or ice skate. All the tree forts I made as a child wouldn't exist. The tire swing wouldn't be there either. All the frogs we caught and the fireflies that we put in jars, would be free.

The trips to the hunting shack where we fished, ate venison, pumped water to drink, and where we came across a porcupine would never have happened. The time my sister and I tried to row the boat and ended up going in a circle. What about all the times we shoveled snow in the early morning before school, and then fell asleep in class because we were tired from shoveling? There's the time I stood on the swing at the school playground and sang "Smokey the Bear" at the top of my lungs?

The times we spent playing basketball at the neighbors and playing tennis on the road were good times. Going to church every Sunday and being poked because I couldn't sit still. The time I sat on my book with a record in it, instead of putting it in my cubby. I grew up in the woods but yet I'm afraid of spiders. I loved to mow the grass and make mazes so we could chase each other playing tag. Every summer I spent my birthday at my Aunt and Uncles house four hours away from home. We always woke up to the smell of banana bread fresh out of the oven. I had to come in before dark because the bats would swoop down into my hair. I was always screaming and running around the yard while my sister chased me and getting into trouble for screaming. Not taking my shoes off before I went into the house, because no one saw me.

The garden was so beautiful. We would pick the carrots and clean them in the grass or on our shirt before we ate them. Grandma always said, "A little dirt won't hurt." One time we found the neighbor boy in the garden in the corn patch crying because he was lost. Then there was the time I wouldn't let my younger sister carry a drink to my uncle and then when I gave it to her, she turned around and smacked into the clothes line pole. She had quite a goose egg on her forehead from that. All the times we had to dress in the barn after swimming and there were always Daddy long-leg spiders in there. We used a puddle in the woods to pretend to catch fish in, and we used leaves as the fish. What about the time I was picking blueberries and stood on an ant hill? There was a time when my friend and I were sledding down the golf course hill and crashed into a tree with the tobaggon and we couldn't use it after that, and our little knees really hurt from it.

Every year we would make a skating rink on the lake. My sister and I would sing silly songs while we skated. My dad would tie two saucers to the back of the snowmobile and pull us around the lake. One time my sister stopped her bike and I didn't see her and ran her over. I think she forgave me for that. I can't forget the time the raft drifted free of its rope and I floated out to the middle of the lake. Every Friday was fish fry, and it was so good. I got my first kiss from a boy when I was ten, he kissed me on my cheek. We were married on the bus one night on the way home from school when we were 11. His last name was the same as my first name. These are just a small glimpse of the experiences I had.

Then there was my very first taste of love, and marriage and being a first time mommy. Then another event took place that would change my direction again. My husband died, but after awhile I found a new love and we had a son. Then a few years later another event would change the course of my life again. My boyfriend got leukemia and had a stroke..he survived after having a bone marrow transplant. All this made me a stronger person. I've learned that life is uncertain and very short, and to never ever take someone for granted.

All these events brought me to a great time in my life. My grandsons' are my gifts. They are part of my mother, my husband, my daughter and also a part of me. The love I have for the boys is all the love from loved ones lost, all wrapped up in two beautiful little children. Now I wouldn't want to change that for the world.

All these circumstances wouldn't exist if that one event didn't take place. Would I want to change my past if it would bring my Mother back? No matter what I want that just wouldn't even be a possibility. Everything happens for a reason, whether we like it or not. All the experiences and memories that I have I want to keep. They are mine and no one can take them from me. They weren't always good memories but in life we have to take the bad with the good.

Does that mean if these events wouldn't have happened my life would be different? Yes, it would have been, but that is a life I don't know.

We can choose our future but we don't know what is going to happen. So wanting to change the past is not a choice either.