Bobcats

I find myself quickly approaching a crossroads. Well. Perhaps not a crossroads. A crossroads would imply that a specific decision must be made, between at least 2 viable options. Or would it be 3? Straight, left, or right? Or 4? Because I suppose one could always turn back around.

I guess, rather than a crossroads, I am approaching a great and spacious "unknown." It's like this; throughout one's life, there are constant and attainable milestones littering one's future. Maybe the first one is starting school. My first was probably becoming a Bobcat. Oh, how I anticipated drinking the wretched bobcat juice, which might have consisted of any number of fanciful boyish fantasies; creature blood, vomit, actual bobcat excrement. It was probably more along the lines of sugarless Koolaid, but oh how I was excited to sup from that fake coconut and twist my face in disgust at whatever it was. So all the other pre-bobcats could writhe in jealousy. So I could be a big deal. A bobcat bitches.

Maybe the next one was high school. You wait your whole life to get there, and suddenly wham! You have 3 friends, none of whom are "cool," and you get made fun of my rednecks all day. Real cool, that goal.

Four years. Such an unbelievably long time. High school was like...forever. The drama, the intrigue, the loneliness, the mischief...seemed like it would never end. Then suddenly it did end. And, despite all of the horror, I liked it. But so what? One more milestone down, one more right around the corner.

I was a missionary. I learned Spanish. I got fat. I baptized people. I didn't eat tacos or grape flavored ANYTHING for 2 years. Suddenly, that too was finished. So what. Now college and a wife.

I assumed the whole wife thing would happen way before college would end, thus giving my life a "purpose." I mean, when you have a wife, then you have kids. You get a job to support said wife and kids. You start buying a house. You get a better job. You acquire "things," and go on vacations, and start your kids on the path to become bobcats and brownies.

But what happens when you accidentally skip the wife part, and just finish college? And with a degree that guides you in no particular direction?

Suddenly, you feel out of readily attainable milestones, and you wonder how it happened.

It's all been so easy to this point; one bobcat after another. Now, the bobcats are much more elusive. I'm not entirely certain which ones to seek out, or where exactly to seek them.

And so, here I sit, ready to (in theory) graduate in 30 days. Do I stay here and languish away in Provo, strapped down by the "where the hell else will I get married" mantra? Do I seek greener pastures?

Gimmie a bobcat here.