Texas

We were sitting on the lower deck, doing our best to stay cool. We had two weeks’ worth of luggage with us, and the two hours ahead of us gave us a chance to take off our massive backpacks and set them at our feet. It was the summer of 2013, and I was on the notorious Eurotrip that many of us American college grads take during the fleeting window of time that sits between proudly earning a degree and having to face the logistics of real, post-grad life.

I despised the weather that we were having during these two weeks traipsing throughout central Europe. We were presently sailing on a ferry from Dubrovnik to Brač, an obscure island on the Croatian coast. My long-time friend and current traveling partner had already been in town for several days before I arrived; I flew in from Berlin the day before. Her and another friend of ours had explored the island during the days prior, having already made some friends at the low-cost hostel to which we were now being ferried.

We talked about the island, our upcoming plans, and the recent alcohol-soaked affairs my friends had enjoyed with people who they’d never see again. We talked about the details casually and fearlessly, the only way that felt natural to us at the time.

I was tingling with excitement to check out the island’s scene. As I sat and listened to the exotic tales, I could feel the sweat soaking through the part of my skirt that was hugging my lower back. (This was likely due to the heatwave, but I was also elated to be living out a European adventure.) The conversation then turned to me — how I had been doing over the past weeks and months?

Prior to Berlin, I had spent a week with a German friend who lived in the western part of the country. She had been kind enough to let me stay with her family, who spoiled me with local treats and did not make fun of my beginner-level German for the entirety of my stay. I was so, so happy to be back in Europe after nearly four years away. I was ready to start something new, but like most recent college grads, I didn’t know just what that something was.

Then there was the issue of my boyfriend, back in Oregon. He and I had a fairly drawn-out, convoluted past year of our relationship, and by the time that I had left town, the idea of our future together had been murky. There had been some coffee shop conversations about where we wanted to end up, whether it be somewhere stateside or in a bustling European capital. Even so, I knew that he didn’t have the same interest in living abroad as I did — not really. At the end of the day, the inspired feeling at the thought of living somewhere out of my element was mine and mine alone.

His next destination was a little town in Texas, where he had an internship lined up. I explained this to my friend as I unstuck my sweat-soaked skirt from myself and wiped my legs with the palms of my hands, repulsed by the heat.

One option that I had upon returning from the trip was to join him in Texas and plot out my next steps from there. Certain feelings formed as I heard this somewhat conflicted story coming out of my own mouth. After all, I’ve never been to Texas, aside from being inside the Houston airport. Other than visiting Austin, I’ve never had a real interest in experiencing what life is like there. “Don’t go there, Gracie,” said my friend, with a sense of real authority on the matter. “Don’t go to Texas.”

It didn’t strike me as being significant at the time, but that afternoon marked a real shift within me. I didn’t have a concrete plan nor the legal means of remaining in Europe longer than the three months that my U.S. passport afforded me, yet something switched on in my mind that told me that I needed to make things work.

From there, I would go on to hunt for jobs in the midst of my travels and eventually end up landing an opportunity back in Berlin. That was all still in the future at this point, though — all I knew while sitting on the ferry, sweating, was that I really did not want to go to Texas. For that matter, I didn’t want to allow the fate of my impending adult life to be based on the seemingly logical option, nor the fact that I lacked anything else to fall back on.

I like to think that people have parallel lives that, somewhere along the way, branch off from their original paths. Almost like exiting a highway, one’s parallel life begins veering off from the main road only slightly, yet it ends up traveling in a different direction entirely. Changing one’s direction can be a result of the tiniest of decisions or most surface-level considerations.

I sometimes find myself thinking about that parallel life — what I would have been doing had I ended up in Texas, or wherever else my absence of direction would have taken me at the time. Perhaps I’d have found a great job in a completely different industry. I may have even become a homeowner by now.

Just as I ponder the life details of my parallel self, she undoubtedly wonders the same things about me. While watching a Texan sunrise, she might think about what could have happened if had she followed her friend’s advice on the ferry. What would it have been like to stay in Europe, to forge a new life there? Would she have found fulfillment?

When I think of the parallel lives that I might have lived, I salute them in passing. They come and go, without malice, and these unlived lives will continue to come into view as I continue down the road. I write this as the version of myself who did not go to Texas, and I’m smiling.