A few summers ago I embarked on this epic summer camp to Tarragona, Spain for a Spanish Language Immersion camp that really my mother simply found online and without hesitation signed me up for. The intense “numa-numa” song dancing, crazy roommate butterfly knife wielding, insane bull fighting stories can be saved for another time. But I can vividly remember, waiting at the airport with my parents, scared out of my freaking mind prior to takeoff, pushing some Panda-Express Chinese food around in my white carton before boarding the plane. To ease my anxiety I of course grabbed a Fortune Cookie hoping that it would say, “Your summer camp in Spain will be incredibly awesome and you will fall in love with the girl of your dreams.”

It didn’t.

But as I ate the cookie before opening the fortune (of course) I slowly unwrapped the cheap white paper to read in red capital letters,

“NEVER LET AN OPPORTUNITY PASS YOU BY. Your lucky numbers are….”

Cheesy, and generic as it may have been, I proceeded to have the time of my life in Spain with that attitude and if you open my wallet I still have that fortune to this day.

I’m not bothered by many things. Apart from holding the door for people without a nod to signify my existence, I’m an easy going guy. But what kills me, what scrunches my stomach into knots, what makes me fidget like a little school boy who has had to go to the bathroom for the past hour but can’t because he has no more of Mrs. Lewis’ damn yellow paper bathroom passes left, is knowing I missed a golden opportunity--a chance for knowledge, a chance for growth, a chance for opening doors, a chance for having an incredible experience. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not jumping into every house window I hear a party emanating from, and I’ve turned down plenty of joyous nights to relish in some much needed studying, but if I know my time hasn’t been spent well, it gets to me.

It’s what pains me the most but it’s essentially what makes me tick. I wake up every morning knowing that every one of my choices directly affects my route and shapes that of others. Just sometimes, it remains difficult to sleep if I don’t choose well.

Maybe I should just read more fortune cookies…

Labels: carpe diem, fortune cookie

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 17, 2007 at 3:38 PM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.