When I was 21, I was driving cross-country from NYC to Los Angeles with a dear childhood friend of mine. I had just finished college and had just gotten rejected from an MFA program in Washington DC. We were driving at the beginning of the two week drive and a sign for Niagara Falls popped up and we both looked at each other. About a half mile later, the sign came up again and my friend slouched in his chair and said “I’d be down.” Another quarter and the sign came up and I said “well, we could. It’s an hour or two out of the way but.” Eighth of a mile. Another sign. He sat up in his chair and looked over at me. I smiled. He looked out in the distance north and said “It’s up to you. What’chu gonna do?” That last sign came, the little one, and the exit was a hundred/fifty/twenty-five/ten and the lane merge into it as to make the decision for you. At the last second, I veered left and looked over at him. He grabbed for a bag of chips and then changed the radio station. “No big deal.” He had flown across the country to drive with me. I failed him that day.

Want a do-over. Wasted a few years of my life dead set on the B from A. Shame how even with the lead-in for the detour, we forget all too fast how the best things are always the most out of the way.