Of moss and stepping stones ...

Sometimes you can’t find where the next stepping stone is … and then sometimes they’re all around you (even those that belong to someone else) … and you can’t see nothing else.
It’s one of those time … I’m surrounded by stepping stones: Nicole’s as they approach her departure date for France (4 days away) … Stef’s as she reaches for her eighth birthday (5 days away) and the start of a new school year (7 days away) … Jonathan’s as he builds his transition from the pale green walls of CAMH to independent living (less than a month away) …
And because of those stepping stones … a series of stones have formed beneath my feet pointing in a myriad of directions that are mine to choose from.
The agony of choice, for me, has always been the possibility of making the wrong one. And that usually leads to the moss growing between my toes as I stand there in contemplation of the paths before me … kinda’ like tracing through a maze to pre-determine the correct path before putting the pencil to paper.
I’ve never been one for the unknown … always trying to peek around the corner to see what’s there … trying to pre-determine the final result to an nth degree of certainty.
Don’t laugh! It’s true … that has been my foolish quest …
A little older and wiser … I realize there’s no hope in hell to know the ending before the beginning … and every now my cynic whispers that since the end result is predetermined from behind the Matrix, the choice matters little … outside of validating that I’ve convinced myself that I have one.
The fear and the cynic nonewithstanding … my current state of mind thinks that the optimimum path with customized twists and turns is more like a gentle stream upon which my life’s journey is suspended … and that the stepping stones pointing the way are the ones that shine in the morning’s light, catching my eye for that extra second with their wink … and that the way to follow them is truly the path of least resistance both externally and internally …
I visualize this central point … all of our journey’s ends … with our unlimited stepping stoned paths radiating from that focal point as far as the eye can see and beyond …
… and me somewhere upon that path trying not to sidestep and mistake west and east for north …
… and then again, even west and east is better than scrubbing moss and fungus from my between my toes.