Regrets

Do you have any regrets in your life? I think it is a common question. How do you define regret? I always think of it as something you wished had never happened. So I have a hard time with regret because I keep thinking about how one decision can change your life path. Some days I think I might regret the fact that I moved here in 2005. Or that I regret quitting my previous job. Or that I regret going back to school for paralegal studies. Or that I regret that I did not get my master's degree. Or I regret that I didn't get to go to my first choice college. But I can not even begin to calculate how each one of those changes would have change my life. And I would not change anything in my past that might mean I would not end up with Ladybug.

But there is one regret I have. One that I am sure in no way really affected the path of my life. So I hang on to it.

I was about 13. I was the budding teenager and lived with my single father. He did not discuss the girly things with us (my sister and I). So I was stumbling through learning about them on my own. I was in the shower and decided it was time for me to shave my legs. It was not my first time but I was in no way versed in the activity. And if truth be told, I didn't really have anything to shave. Just a little peach fuzz. But it is a right of passage.

So I slowly drew the disposable razor up my leg. Over and over. But as I said...I only had peach fuzz. I couldn't tell if it was doing anything. I shaved again. I couldn't tell. So I decided to test it. And I slowly dragged the razor up my belly just below my belly button. What would possess me to do that? Relax. No blood shed. But I still couldn't tell if the razor was working. So I gave up.

It was a few days later that I discovered that the razor was working. Because it was then that the fresh stubble on my belly started to show. Who would have thought that one simple movement of the hand would give me something to deal with my entire life.

I don't notice it so much these days. I spent most of my 20's painfully plucking out each hair. Of course they would grow back. Longer and darker each time. But it was vanity. I, obviously, have gotten a whole lot less vane lately. That, and I can no longer see the lower half of my belly without holding the upper half out of the way. But today as I started the "starvation" part of my diet again...I am hopeful that I will be able to see that part of my belly again and I don't want it to be hairy.

So I do have one regret.... well, and as of today I seriously regret not buying a new car earlier this year. Yep! The car died. Again.

Mean Mama