TIME ALONE

We all have two choices in life ...
one ...
to be in a good situation
and two ...
to get out of bad one!

The summer I was sixteen
my parents did me the biggest favour of all
I was at the age of leaving my childhood
and slowly entering into my manhood
and like most teenagers
I thought I had all the answers
and the world in my back pocket.

Little did I know
that I was going down the wrong street in life.

I had some anger inside of me
about what ... I'm not too sure
maybe resentment at my parents for divorcing
or maybe that was my excuse.

I took to the wrong crowd of friends
and was going no where in no time flat
My mom had no choice
but to send me to spend the summer
with my dad out by the lake.

I felt anger by being sent out there
away from my "good" buddies.

To this day I don't know if this was my mom's way
of punishing me
or hoping my father could change me.

I never knew what "silence" was till that summer
for my father left me alone
... alone with myself.

Time was really lonely
when I look back on it
but it was only lonely
cause I made it that way.

Left with myself and the "silence"
and lots of time just for "thoughts"
for the first time ever
I saw my "life".

As I sat out on that rickety old dock
listening to the wind and water
and everything slowly began
to changed inside of me
like night to day.

I was no longer lonely as the days moved on
it had become plain as english to me
"life" is and always will be just that ... "life".

I never knew how the silence of time
can change a person
and make you take a good look at yourself and life.

I learnt a lot that summer on that old dock
but most of all
I learnt about myself
realizing I do have choices
and that up to now
I was choosing all the wrong ones.

I was letting my anger and friends
walk me down a lonely path in life
... a path to nowhere.

I learnt a great lesson that summer
I learnt how not to hate the tomorrows
not to hate being alive
and out of all the roads ahead
I "DO"
get to choose most of my paths in life.

As I look back on that summer when I was sixteen
I wonder why my dad was so quiet
and left me to myself ...
I wonder if he knew mother nature
heals all ...
I have to thank my mom
for sending me to a place to find ME.

At the time
I think I resented you,
but now years later
as I looked back at it all
you actually saved me.

I learnt sometimes in life
you have to find the answers inside of yourself
and that no one can give them to you.

It's funny ...
I went through a hard time a few years back
and where did I go for peace
"out on the water".

It hit me that summer ...
the one FRIEND in life you should NEVER cross
is yourself,
if your not friends with yourself
you are truly alone.

Today, I find it's very important
to not lose touch with who you are inside
and not to let others make you feel insecure.

I wonder now ...
if it was one of those times they say as parents,
"We did it because we loved you".

I'd like to think it was so.