The Crossroads of Choice

 

The image is inspired by one of the most enduring legends in American music.

It depicts Robert Johnson sitting alone at a lonely Mississippi crossroads late at night, guitar in hand. According to blues folklore, Johnson met a mysterious stranger at such a crossroads, who tuned his guitar and, in exchange for his soul, granted him extraordinary musical talent. Although there is no historical evidence that this ever happened, the story became inseparable from Johnson's legacy because of his astonishing skill, his mysterious life, and his death at just 27 years old.

The crossroads legend symbolizes more than a supernatural bargain. It has become a metaphor for the price of greatness, ambition, sacrifice, and the difficult choices that define a person's life. Whether viewed as myth, metaphor, or Southern folklore, it helped make Robert Johnson one of the most influential figures in the history of the blues, inspiring generations of musicians from Eric Clapton and Keith Richards to Jimi Hendrix.

The picture captures that legendary moment, not as documented history, but as one of America's greatest musical myths, where talent, mystery, and the unknown meet at a lonely crossroads under the moonlight.

 

The Crossroads of Choice

 

Over the years, I have spent a great deal of time observing people. Not as a psychologist or philosopher, but as a husband, father, worker, employer, and student of life. The older I get, the less certain I become that any single explanation can account for why some people succeed while others struggle. We are often told that the environment determines outcomes. Certainly, the environment matters. Poverty matters. Education matters. Family matters. Opportunity matters. I have no trouble acknowledging any of that.

But I have also seen too many exceptions. I grew up poor. By all accounts, I should have chosen the easier road like my father before me. I worked from the age of ten delivering newspapers, mowing lawns, and doing whatever jobs I could find. Later came night school, learning a trade, and building a career. Looking back, many of those decisions involved choosing discomfort today for a reward that would not arrive for years.

Why? I honestly do not know. Economists call it delayed gratification. Psychologists speak of self-control. Philosophers debate free will. Yet none of these explanations seems entirely satisfying. Recently, I began thinking about the difference between present value and future value. At every crossroads in life, there appears to be a choice. One road offers comfort now. The other offers the possibility of something greater later. The second road usually requires sacrifice, patience, discipline, and a measure of uncertainty. There are no guarantees.

Yet some people consistently choose the "future value over the present value." I struggle to understand why. I always thought, I am no one special, I am average, yet if I can do it, make a good life, well, anyway I can. Consider work, when I was growing up, it was common for young people to have jobs. We delivered newspapers, bagged groceries, swept floors, and mowed yards. The pay was not much, but perhaps the money was not the most important lesson. We learned that effort preceded reward. We learned that if we wanted something, we often had to wait and work for it. I had to mow 50 lawns at $2.00 per lawn at age 10 to buy a $100 bicycle. I had to deliver newspapers every day, seven days a week, for two months to buy that $100.00 bike. Today, many of those opportunities no longer exist or are far less common. Whether that matters, I do not know. But I wonder if those small experiences helped teach delayed gratification at an early age.

Then I think of my own family. My wife and her brother were raised by the same parents, in the same home, under the same roof. Yet their outcomes could not be more different. My wife worked throughout high school, became disciplined with money, attended college, and built a successful life. Her brother struggled repeatedly and lives in poverty today. My sister babysat at the age of 16, I think, but I do not remember her ever having a job when we were kids, and we are only 18 months apart in age. Today, she is poor, making bad decisions all her life, and I have made it on a high school education to millionaire status, plus some. Same parents, same environment. Different outcomes.

Then I think of my twins. Both were born premature. My son Jacob struggled more as an infant and spent his entire K-12 education under an Individualized Education Program. My daughter Abigail developed more easily in her early years. Different challenges. Different paths. Yet both graduated from college. Both became successful adults. Both worked from high school onward. Both had summer jobs in high school, and I made sure of that. Again, the simple explanations begin to break down. Environment clearly matters. Family clearly matters. Opportunity clearly matters. But they do not seem to explain everything. This leaves me with an uncomfortable conclusion. There appears to be something else at work. I call it choice. Not because I can define it. Not because I can measure it. Not because I fully understand it. In fact, the more I study it, the more elusive it becomes.

We can measure income, test scores, attendance, crime rates, and educational attainment. We can measure almost everything surrounding a choice. We cannot measure the choice itself. At some point, every person arrives at a crossroads. Present value or future value. Comfort now or sacrifice now for something greater later. Why one person turns left while another turns right remains one of life’s greatest mysteries. I do not claim to have the answer. I merely offer the observation. Perhaps the greatest question is not why some people fail. Perhaps the greater question is why some people willingly choose hardship today in pursuit of a future they cannot yet see.

 

That is the question I continue to wrestle with.