Guest Posts on County 10 are provided by contributors and the opinions, thoughts, and comments within are their own and may not necessarily reflect those of County 10.
Chaos, not the actual upheaval we experience far too often, but the more metaphysical “Chaos Theory” has a fascinating core premise. It’s called the “Butterfly Effect.” It is based on the idea that the simplest choice you can make, a seemingly inconsequential act, can have profound effects.
The name comes from the idea that a single butterfly flapping its wings halfway across the world can create change thousands of miles away. The gentle breeze created by these colorful insects is enough over time to change entire weather systems, and by default, drastically affect other areas of the planet.
That seems like a far-fetched event unless you’re a science fiction fan and remember when Mothra went to war with Godzilla in Tokyo.
Butterfly theory is akin to a concept expressed by many people since the late Medieval period. Throwing a pebble into the middle of a still pond creates ripples. Books have been written on the “ripple effect.” Once again, a small act that has big consequences as the waves from that pebble spread out in concentric circles, then roll back from the short to their starting point.
I’m a poetry fan, usually in the form of song lyrics, but Robert Frost has been a companion for a long, long time. His most famous work, and my personal favorite, is “The Road Less Traveled.”
It’s not a big jump, in fact, it’s not a jump at all, to see how chaos theory and pebbles in a pond tie into Frost’s epic poem. Here is the fourth and final stanza of his work.
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.
If our lives were condensed from decades to a single year, with all four seasons in place, I’m cognizant that at 68, it’s the autumn of my life. Looking back on almost seven decades, I see turning points, roads less traveled, that have made a profound difference in my path.
I’m not unique; everyone can see those same crossroads in their existence.
I wrote a few weeks ago about almost declining my teaching career since the construction money in 1980 was so good. Taking the job in Lusk was the road less traveled, most of my high school friends were following the big bucks to the mines, construction or oil fields.
As a high school senior, I had an appointment to the United States Naval Academy thanks to high scores on the ACT and the nomination of U.S. Representative Teno Roncalio.
With three weeks before departing for Plebe Summer in Annapolis, I declined the appointment. It made someone else’s life change direction since they took my vacant position.
If I’d taken it, I’d never have been a history teacher, a coach, a writer, a farmer, ran a construction company, or become so ingrained in Fremont County that I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.
Those all pale with the path that led me to Safeway in Lusk 44 years ago, where I met my best friend and the love of my life in a chance encounter at the checkout stand.
I would never have met Susan Kay Hahn if my choices, and my parents’ choices, hadn’t led me on the road to Niobrara County High School.
A year late, 43 years ago this coming Thursday, I stood in the front of St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Lusk on a blazingly hot June afternoon and made the best choice of my life.
That kid who wanted to be a naval aviator, then a civil engineer, an anthropologist, a historian and finally a history teacher never knew what was ahead, he just forged on into the future with his God given gifts and talents and a strong upbringing by Luther and Jan.
Any one of those decisions made differently would have changed everything. The outcome would be vastly different. That’s true for you as well, just one change in the past and think where you’d be now, who you would be with and perhaps most importantly who would not be here.
Without Brian and Staci, Katelin and Adam would never be part of the family, without all four, there would be no Jayne, no Norah, no Morgan, and no Matthew. The loss to me would be insurmountable.
Your family arrived amidst the chaos as well. Once again, not the chaos of life, but the theory that your actions have profound effects yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
How far can you take this?
My departed Mom took it to the extreme. She was a championship worrier. She worried about things that would never happen, worried about things that already did, and worried about immediate things. If there was an Olympic event in worrying, she would have been a gold medalist.
In retrospect, she wasn’t worrying but expressing an intelligent woman’s views of life as expressed by “The Road Not Taken,” chaos theory, and those blindly tossed stones in the stillness of the pond of life.
And now a song lyric from the dark (ok, not so dark) days of 1974. A time when I talk about it that always generates an eyeroll or snide comments from the kids when I say, “back when I had a future.”
Poetry from the streets of Motor City, and classic Motown artist Gladys Knight (don’t forget the Pips) in the form of their hit “The Makings of You.”
Oh, why does it seem the past is always better
We look back and think
The winters were warmer
The grass was greener
The skies were bluer
And smiles were bright
Can it be that it was all so simple then
Or has time rewritten every line
And if we had the chance to do it all again
Tell me
Would we
Could we
Sing it pretty Gladys, the only way you know how.
I’ve watered down chaos theory to its essence, but in reality, the connections everyone makes in their life are as vast as the universe. Every person you meet, every student you taught, everyone you worked with, played with, or interacted with in any fashion is part of those ripples and the beat of those butterfly wings. The connections are as boundless as grains of sand on all the beaches of the world.
Thursday marks 43 years as one with my best friend. Happy anniversary, Sue.