"The Road Not Taken."

Chronicle of a Shrink's journey from youthful
know-it-all to inevitable old-fart astonishment.

Dr. Bawb has periodically regretted his years-back
descision not to stick with UCLA Pharmacology; another name for Neurophysiology. That's American poet Robert Frost who recited
at JFK's 1961 Inaugural although not one of his more familiar works which include The Road Not Taken. A pretty commonplace occurance for us all at any point in life. Doubts recur anytime and anywhere. My job [and many other ethical therapists] was NEVER to force choice[s] upon clients. To me best ability I tried to clarify the ambiguities and leave choosing to the client. How better can any therapist show respect for any Client?

The dilemma may present as simply as young Marlon Brando's "I coulda been a contender!" rant to his cousin cum gangland boss Lee J. Cobb in On The Waterfront or with the complexity of Robert Frost's The Road Not Taken. As a one-time Therapist and full-time human being with strengths and frailties of youth turned to old age I demanded of myself and Once-and-Future Therapists I supervised identical respect be given to the Dilemma - haltingly or eloquently expressed. Consider Robert Frost at his best:

THE ROAD NOT TAKEN

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.