Not too long ago, I passed a car with a license plate that read “WHATIF.” I’ve always been struck by those who have tags like “360 GUY” (“All Around Guy,” get it?) or EDUGATR (not as clever, but more so than my tag’s I.D. with random numbers I can’t remember when asked to provide them on a registration form.) I really wondered: What was the WHATIF driver trying to convey?
Maybe he was part of a national introspective movement that sold bumper stickers and T-shirts with “What If?” stamped in bold letters. Perhaps a rock-the-universe pivotal moment in his life gave said driver enough pause to ponder the meaning of it all so he quit the 60-hours-a-week job, ditched the unhappy relationship and hopped on the interstate for a life-changing road trip.
Seems to me, requesting this turn of phrase at the tag office is a very intentional act.
Maybe he just wanted to prod other drivers to ask the same question. If so, permission requested.
Middle age introduced me to “What if.”
I never thought much about the untraveled roads of life until I turned 40, because I was a) too caught up in life’s whirlwind of high school, college, first job, marriage, first home, babies, seconds on college, job, home and babies; b) rich with self-projected certitude about my choices; c) immortal; and d) completely full of hooey about b and c.
Looking back on the choices of my youth, I realize how absolutely youthful I was.
What if I made a wrong career choice? Who cares? I have the rest of my life for a new start. What if I lost touch with a close friend? I’ll re-connect when life is calmer. What if I never followed my passion to be a Big Band singer? I’ll sing when I retire at my oceanfront home with the recording studio.
You know the rest of the story, the chapter with the real answers. You know because you’ve lived it, too. You’ve asked “What if?” You’ve lived with “What now?” I have as well, often finding the re-written chapters — the ones edited with unexpected narrative — to be more beautiful, more fulfilling, than the original (cue Garth Brooks’ “Thank God for Unanswered Prayer”).
But, we know too well the other part of the story. The chapter of unrealized dreams. Hopefully, we’ll have time for a few “do overs.”
Yet, it’s the non-refundable part of “What if?” that gets to me lately. I know of families right now hurting with unexpected losses of loved ones. They thought they had more time. May they find comfort in knowing their “What if” checklist was full of memories of love and happiness and, most importantly, togetherness. No one ever regrets asking “What if I hadn’t spent so much time with those I loved?”
The driver sped ahead of me. I couldn’t see where he was heading. I drove slowly behind him humming Frank Sinatra until the car faded over the hill.