upon this Groundhog's day an epiphany has been discovered

So there's been a lot of struggle in my brain lately and when laying in bed this morning it settled in a manner that is explainable in words. At this moment, I am 26 years old. I am married, have a 4 year old dog, a mortgage, and a decent paying job with good health insurance. I am in college trying to become a literature professor, and that is a slow process. I'm often discouraged and debate giving up, as this path is going to take several years at minimum to complete. My biological clock is going TICK-EFFING-TOCK, more so now than ever, especially that it seems like EVERYONE around me is having children. I worry that I am making a mistake in waiting to have a family- my brother, sister, and I were the youngest of the family; our cousins were at least ten to twenty years older than we were. I want my children to grow up with their cousins and with our friend's children. But I also want to be through school and out of my current job before trying to juggle kids. In a quip, I want my cake and to eat it, too. At this point, I start to think of regrets I have about choices I've made concerning my delay in return to college and about prioritizing my career path over a family. My husband, ever the realist, points out the practicality of my decisions and will tell me outright that I want kids just because everyone else is having them. There is some truth in what he says, but I can't make an unbiased argument one way or the other. Living in my pity party brought to mind a poem that helps soothe my torn soul.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost

Poem Credit http://www.bartleby.com/119/1.html

I know in my heart that the choices I am making now are only going to help me and my family. Being able to provide the things I want to for my kids, giving them opportunities I didn't have because of finances will be worth it. With every choice there is a sacrifice one way or another. I can't have it all right now, the world just doesn't work that way. I am thankful for the good things in my life: my husband, my family, my home, my job, my ability to recognize everything I'm blessed with. This may not be a strictly academic post, but the tie to Frost felt appropriate for it.