One moment can change your entire life. The thought is terrifying, and sometimes I lay awake at night thinking about how the smallest decisions I made that day could make my life completely different five years from now.
About a month ago, my best friend and I were sitting on her couch watching "Gossip Girl" mindlessly, and we tried to recall how we became friends. At first, we thought it was a significant moment or that something amazing must have happened for the world to put us together. After thinking about the timeline of our friendship, it ended up being so simple.
It started with a small chain of events.
When I was a sophomore in high school, I decided to join my high school band. My brother convinced me to begin playing the trombone (which I was terrible at).
I started during the second semester, and I had no one. I was in color guard for marching band so I knew who everyone was, but I wasn’t close with them by any means. I felt alone. Everyone had already made friends and formed their groups. I was just the new girl. The sister of the goofy kid.
One day my brother brought in a cake to the band room. After school, a flute player came up to me and asked why. Five years later, I still remember my response:
“I don’t know, but I made it.”
Those words were some of the first to my now best friend. Somehow, out of a simple inquiry about cake, an amazing friendship formed and my life changed without me even knowing. I suddenly had friends in band. I no longer stood in the back of class by myself. I found someone I could talk to about anything, from our hopes and dreams to what our favorite show is on HGTV.
I have no idea what I would do without my best friend. She is there for me in every situation. But in that line of events leading up to our friendship, one alternate decision could have prevented our lives from ever crossing.
We make our choices based on how we feel at that time and it just so happens that it will most likely affect you. The college you go to, the people you surround yourself with and the copious amounts of coffee you consume will all impact your life in some way.
It is impossible to go through life constantly thinking about how every decision we make could change us. It would distract us from the bigger picture and from living our lives as normal, functioning people. I’ll admit, when I look back on my life so far, I realize that I could have made some different choices.
Don’t get me wrong, I am unbelievably happy with the way my life is, but what if I had done things differently? What would my life be like now if I had not chosen the things I did the way I did for the big moments of my life? Would I be the same person I am now? Probably not. Every moment, good or bad, leading up to this one has made me who I am. And at the end of the day, I’m OK with that.
