What If

What if I hadn't been kidnapped by a stranger when I was four?

What if I never saw my six-year-old playmate 

hanging by his bathroom belt 

from a shower rod 

when I was nine?

What then? 

Would I be happier today? 

More trusting? 

Less fearful?

Might I have been a better mother? 

What if I hadn't spent twenty years 

running through the city streets on cement?

Would I still need hip replacement surgery right now?

What if I hadn't married my first husband and moved to Washington, DC? 

Would I have met my second husband? 

Would I ever live in Maine?

So many what ifs. 

So many possibilities. 

We struggle to gain control, to keep control, to not lose control. 

But really, our lives are little more 

than one chance occurrence 

piled onto another.