Realistically, every day each one of us makes decisions that affect our lives. Little tiny choices that intentionally or inadvertently calibrate the directions we’re headed and the places we’re going. Do you choose to put that project off again, further damning it to never get done? Do you call that person you haven’t seen in months and realize you’ve missed them? All sorts of these little things shape people in subtle unconscious ways.

But I know that looking back in my life there have been moments of major upheaval, times when I made decisions that had major, long-term impacts on my life that I can’t quite imagine what in the world I would be if I’d made the decisions differently. I sort of feel like I’m in one of those periods right now (accepting a job offer! buying a home! trying to sell a book!), and so I thought it might be good to look back at some of the big ones in the past.

December 1993: Leaving Boston
I dropped out of college after my first semester and moved back to Seattle, where I transferred to the UW. I managed to snag a dear friend out of the three months I spent at Emerson College (hi Megan!), but what the fuck would have happened if I’d stayed in Boston and finished my Musical Theater degree?

August 1995: Leaving Chris N.
Ah, my first boyfriend. We spent 3 years cycling through some very bad patterns. We bickered constantly, broke up and got back together many times, and were totally codependent. We held each other back and used the other as a security blanket rather than grow up. We finally broke up in late ‘95, and thanks to some rare determination on my side, stayed broken up. He lives in Issaquah with his wife and is a nice guy, but my life would look nothing like it does today if I’d stayed with him.

April 1996: Going to my first rave
What would I have dedicated 5+ years of my life to if I hadn’t gone to that rave that took place in a barn in Monroe? I only went on a whim because I was itching for a party and got an invite from the friend of a coworker. Raving birthed my writing career, my relationship with my now-husband, and pushed me to peak joy-capacity for a really long time. What if I’d been busy that night in April of ‘96 and not gone to “Back to the Bubble Beats”? Would I have been a Phishead? A swing dancer? A loner? Who knows!

Early 1997: Avoiding addiction
I spent almost a year in close contact with people doing a lot of really addictive, dangerous, disgusting drugs. Somehow I managed to come out of the experience with only one rock bottom weekend, no addictions, and no lasting physical harm. (No comment re: lasting effects on short term memory.) The irony here is that part of why I stayed safe was because my then-sort-of-boyfriend advised me to “steer clear of white powders” — and he eventually died of an overdose. Close call.

June 2001: Attending Columbia Publishing Course
Marked the end of an era (quit Lotus, and realized I didn’t really want to run a magazine any more) and the beginning of connections that are still playing themselves out and being revealed. What if I hadn’t taken the advice of that random dude at Burning Man (honestly, I didn’t even know his name) and apply to CPC?

…And now, here we are in Spring 2005 and it feels like I’m making decisions that will affect my life for a long time. I’m committing to projects and places and people and ideas in ways that are going to require some major follow through and shape things to come for years. It’s sort of exciting, but at the same time I’m trying not to think about it too much because otherwise my head might cave in, like a deep sea jellyfish brought up to the surface of the ocean and oh no! the pressure, captain! Its head — it’s inverting! Sad deflated-brain jellyfish. Back to the bottom of the subconsciousness sea for you! That’s where all the really interesting personal development stuff happens, anyway.