Watched another interesting Martin Sheen movie the other night: Stella Days. The story revolves around an older Irish priest, banished to a cold and dark and conservative village because he complained about his treatment while scholar in Rome. As with most Martin Sheen's movies, it is not only interesting, but pushes the viewer to reflect on a major…or poignant…life issue. In this case, it has to do with regrets. Father Barry has a number of regrets, among them, speaking out and thus being the cause of his 'demotion' to rural Ireland. He longs to finish his thesis in lordly Rome.
That got me thinking about regrets in my own life, and the role played by 'paths not taken' along the way. As one moves deeper into the seventies of life, one's perspective on those oaths gets clearer in the distance. I regret, for example, moving directly from school to University, and from University to Seminary. I wish, in retrospect, that I'd the foresight and courage to step away and go somewhere else for an experience. That possibility struck me most forcibly in 2001 when we were in Turkey. I loved Turkey - Istanbul and the Ilhara valley in Cappodocia particularly. What a different experience that would bee for a 20 year old! How would that have changed my life? Just getting there would have changed my life! To become the person who would make that break would have made me a totally different person.
I regret not moving back to the north as a minister when I was a bit more mature than in 1959m at 26. Of course it would have been much more difficult with a family, and with a spouse who was so totally tied to "home" in Winnipeg. Not that I was much different. Moving to Alberta seemed like a Great Leap to me!
Leaving my first marriage was a very hard choice, but I have no regrets about that choice. I have regrets about some of the consequences of that choice. The impact on my children is one area where i have regrets. They suffered, and I suffer now from that suffering. But the initial choice? I had to do it, after months of struggle. The cost of remaining would have been too costly for me, personally.
I regret that I didn't 'break the rules' more often as an adolescent. I mean the BIG rules. I was such a straight-line-walker. I have a hunch that at least some of that comes from being an 'only' child, and thus dependent for approval only on parents - and only on one parent, for the six years of the war when my father was away. Looking back, and reflecting on the lives my own kids, I can see that I felt 'without support' when it came to choices. I really don't don't know if that support was any help to my kids in making choices, and most of the time, they appeared to be straight-line-walkers as well. I guess I just don't know…but I imagine. I am now much more intentional about choices, although, to be fair, the choices are not very radical or costly. I say what I think more often, and I write what I think very often. I am clearly not done with this line of thought. "More anon", as Grandma Black used to say…
That got me thinking about regrets in my own life, and the role played by 'paths not taken' along the way. As one moves deeper into the seventies of life, one's perspective on those oaths gets clearer in the distance. I regret, for example, moving directly from school to University, and from University to Seminary. I wish, in retrospect, that I'd the foresight and courage to step away and go somewhere else for an experience. That possibility struck me most forcibly in 2001 when we were in Turkey. I loved Turkey - Istanbul and the Ilhara valley in Cappodocia particularly. What a different experience that would bee for a 20 year old! How would that have changed my life? Just getting there would have changed my life! To become the person who would make that break would have made me a totally different person.
I regret not moving back to the north as a minister when I was a bit more mature than in 1959m at 26. Of course it would have been much more difficult with a family, and with a spouse who was so totally tied to "home" in Winnipeg. Not that I was much different. Moving to Alberta seemed like a Great Leap to me!
Leaving my first marriage was a very hard choice, but I have no regrets about that choice. I have regrets about some of the consequences of that choice. The impact on my children is one area where i have regrets. They suffered, and I suffer now from that suffering. But the initial choice? I had to do it, after months of struggle. The cost of remaining would have been too costly for me, personally.
I regret that I didn't 'break the rules' more often as an adolescent. I mean the BIG rules. I was such a straight-line-walker. I have a hunch that at least some of that comes from being an 'only' child, and thus dependent for approval only on parents - and only on one parent, for the six years of the war when my father was away. Looking back, and reflecting on the lives my own kids, I can see that I felt 'without support' when it came to choices. I really don't don't know if that support was any help to my kids in making choices, and most of the time, they appeared to be straight-line-walkers as well. I guess I just don't know…but I imagine. I am now much more intentional about choices, although, to be fair, the choices are not very radical or costly. I say what I think more often, and I write what I think very often. I am clearly not done with this line of thought. "More anon", as Grandma Black used to say…
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