Life is a one way journey.....choose wisely if you can.

I have often noted that life is a series of twists and turns, but in life they all go in one direction. No returns.

You have many crossroads in life where you have to make a choice. You choose a direction and move on. These choices are both physical and mental. You can choose what you do and where you go. Also choose your responses to the many stimulus that you will encounter as the minutes turn into years.

No regrets? A great theme to live by....if you can! The big IF....if I could do it over again, what choices would I make now?.... what difference would it have made in my journey of life?

I had once planned to be an oceanographer....instead I trained as a Geologist (Earth Scientist) and developed into and Environmental Hydrogeologist as a career....up until I became an entrepreneur and started an environmental services business.

Once again I'm happy with the choices I've made. Certainly things could be different....some better and some worse?....more friends, more experiences?.....but I do have few regrets.... all of these interactions and experiences shape you.

So, there are still many choices ahead of me (I think!) but one never really knows what the future will bring.

Ah, a turn in the journey to enjoy that bowl of cherries!

Where are we now?

I have long used the two points on a piece of paper to bring a concrete timeline to your life on this earth. Put two points on a piece of paper, connect them with a line....one is the beginning of your life and one is the end....now mark where you are on that line. It does't matter exactly where you put it, but it brings a very serious reality check!

Now, another exercise is to try and identify a few of the high points of your life and a few of the low. Usually, your life can be somewhat defined by a few of these highs and lows.

I would have to say starting our business was a high since it has provided us with many learning opportunities. Life at the cottage on the lake. Travelling with Vaughn, European trips and the Great Loop trip by boat.

Maybe I'm in denial but I don't dwell on the lows. Certainly there have been conflicts and concerns but I feel like I've been fortunate or at least I think I have. There are certainly many who are much less fortunate than I have been.

Deaths are certainly lows. Births are highs...particularly grandchildren when you can usually have the time and resources to appreciate them.....tiempo para guzarlos.

...and a great partner to share the stops along the way!

Halfway there already!

Highlights of my Journey Through Life will share some of the many of the images of life I've captured with a camera and include a varied mix of musings about the environment we live in and life itself. It will also thread together some quotes about life and this journey through it. We are most lucky for the experience.

I would have to suggest that this journey is already half over since I'm 55 years old.....only a small chance that I could live to be 110. Dad died at 87 and mom at 82 shortly thereafter. I'd be happy to meet their average!, so I think now. At the other end of the spectrum are Benjamin James and Mia Anne TePastte, the grandtwins who have just turned 3. Great perspectives on the future. I wish them a long and happy one.

Sprinklings of the past also remind me of two younger guys who I worked with. Jim and John were shoulder to shoulder then....both are now dead from cancer. And of Matthan, my nephew, dead at 16 in a terrible car accident. Of Nate who died as a toddler. And more recently our friend Janet passed of cancer. There are many more without looking too hard......

So celebrate every day and enjoy every sandwich., for you will likely never know when it's your last.

Jim