Trip Back in Time

I always say that I enjoy going back and reading all my old entries.  Since I've been moving everything over here from LJ, I've been going back and re-reading all my old posts as they've transferred.  It's crazy how much times have changed.  It all got me thinking, if I could travel back in time and change any one of my decisions, would I?

Maybe I'm just an overly optimistic person, but I really don't think that I would.  I'm a believer in the butterfly effect of the chaos theory, and so any one small change that I would have made would have drastically altered my life.  Let's do a for instance -- say I wish now that I'd done better in school (I don't, just pretend, here).  I could say, "I would change my decision to start playing quake so that I could spend more time working on school work."

Granted, this would be no small change in my life, as that single decision to start playing a video game has shaped who I am today.  Sad?  Maybe.

Playing quake sparked my interest in computers and the internet as a whole, and led to my decision to learn all I could about computers.  Not only that, it was my poor performance in school that led to my attending VCU.  (No offense to VCU, It's a fantastic school -- I just couldn't get in any other school had I wanted to, with barely a 2.0 GPA coming out of high school)  I actually had to take a semester off before going to VCU because I wasn't accepted when I first applied.  It was a karate instructor of mine that was an associate Dean at VCU that was able to help me get in after that first rejection.  If any of those decisions had changed, my life would be totally different.  I wouldn't have started my first semester in the Art school, I would have gone straight to Computer Science or something.  I wouldn't have transferred to a different school my second semester.  That was my wife's first semester.  That semester, we had two classes together, and I really got to know her. I wouldn't be living where I am, or working where I am because I wouldn't have been in the same places at the same times.  Everything would be different.  

Who's to say whether that's a good or a bad thing?  I'm certainly not going to try to make that call, but I'm very happy with my life today, and I know that any change I would make would drastically alter where I am today.  Thinking about things like that also makes me realize that each and every decision I make today drastically alters my future.  

Just something to think about.