Sometimes I have flashbacks of certain roads.
Maybe because I have spent so much time with them.
Living on them. Loving them. Hating them.
Wondering where certain ones will lead.
1.
Walking on a rocky dirt road with thick jungle to my right and a trash covered beach to my left. My sense of adventure is heightened after hearing tales from an expatriate in a hostel of a black panther that stalks his home.
I am 23, and once again letting go at the life I thought I had. My hair is carelessly short, and I don’t do anything to tame it. I have no money in my bank account or future plans, other than a lofty desire to change the world through what I write.
I sit on the beach and write poetry. The words are naked and beyond me. The ocean waves break into my mind, affecting the cadence.
I have never felt so free.
2.
The road is ambling, full of potholes and bumps from the harsh New England winters. The dirty river, which imagine to be chocolate, is eating away at the bank, causing the road to grow narrow as I grow taller.
I am eight, and my imagination takes me everywhere. I am an explorer, a sailor, an astronaut. I am abandoned on a deserted island with nothing but tree bark to survive on.
I am strong. I am well-loved. I am going to change the world.
3.
A decade later, I walk down a path in East Texas, intoxicated by fragrant white flowers that grow wild on bushes, their scent pushing its way into my broken heart, my guilty mind. I mutter prayers to myself, everything and anything, so desperately seeking God to make me better. I make my way into the pine woods, oblivious to the lengthening shadows and the dozens of things to accomplish the next day.
I am hungry, deep in the pit of my stomach. I am desperate to be more.
They say life is a journey, and I understand why.
I see my life so far in moments.
In places.
In walks down roads.
It is not a straight path or a neat track where you can time and measure and compare your position to others before you cross a finish line.
Instead, it is a crooked path down a series of roads that seem sporadic and misguided, and if analyzed too deeply I may come believe I am lost.
But when I stop my analysis and close my eyes I once again become the first eight-year-old astronaut,
And as I blast off above the atmosphere, I take my gaze off the stars ahead and look down and see,
All roads interconnecting and intertwining and leading me to one place:
Here and now.
brookelouvier.com 
This was a very lovely post, Brooke!