Story Lines

She had always seen her life going in many directions. She could never settle on one single story line. The problem wasn't that a story line never had presented itself to her. The problem was that one million different equally alluring story lines kept presenting themselves to her. She had never been able to choose one so for a long time she had been numbed. She had seen friends having their story line dangled in front of them by others and following it blindly, seemingly content with that. Others had theirs blown onto their laps by the wind or by chance, who knew. But every time she tried to exit her room a magazine as thick as a phone book full of story lines would somehow block her way. She wanted to choose one, she really did. When she peaked out the door she could she how her friends' story lines unfolded and developed because they had already chosen. It seemed so simple for them, she thought. How could they just toss away the story lines they'd talked and dreamed about as kids and adolescents? For her, each of her most familar story lines, were like dear friends. But she knew they weren't good friends. They were the kind of friends in movies that would keep the protagonist in his/her sometimes self destructive ways in the little village they were all from. One thing she knew for sure, and that was, that she didn't want NOT choosing a story line to be her story line although it felt like it was what she was living and stuck in at the moment. She'd always been eager to proof to herself and everybody that she could choose one herself. And she did a few times and pursued it with all she had. But it wasn't until now she was ready to acknowledge that maybe trying to intertwine her storyline with someone else could be just as rewarding as proving to herself she was a big, strong, beautiful warrior of life. Maybe it wasn't so bad to actually look in the direction of pointing fingers instead of dashing them out of the way. Maybe it was time to shut up and listen.