Michigan’s AmeriCorps Member Council Posting #37

Hello and welcome back to the Michigan’s AmeriCorps Member Council blog. This is Christine Sisung with the 4-H Mentor Michigan Initiative. It is hard to believe I am wrapping up my second year of service which has really brought me into reflection mode of my time spent in AmeriCorps service.

Robert Frost’s poem, The Road Not Taken, summed up from beginning to end the path I chose to travel during my two years of service. The road you take may not always be the one most traveled – or the easiest – but it is your choice. When all of my college friends where expecting full-time jobs offers with decent salaries, benefit packages, and 401ks; I took the road less traveled and became a Michigan’s AmeriCorps member.

Instead of taking a teaching job in another state I signed up to make a difference in my community. This road wasn’t traveled by my friends. But now I have friends considering giving part of their time to service! They have seen the impact it has made in my life and the excitement I have from AmeriCorps.

While this less traveled road may feel challenging at times it also can be extremely rewarding and successful. The time on the less traveled road can bring you to a new destination that has a more rewarding future. My time has brought direction to my future career choice, opportunities to grow personally and professional, and a dedication to find the time to continue to give back.

Choosing the traveled road would have been the easy choice, but not the best. Instead of feeling fulfilled I would have been in a job I didn’t love and not completely knowing what I wanted to be. At times I wanted to turn around and take the easier road. If I had, I wouldn’t be where I am toady. Service brings you down the less traveled road but it will leave a lasting impact on your life.

Through my two years of service on the less traveled road I have had an experience I will never forget. I am nearing the end of my service with AmeriCorps. That won’t change the fact that the less traveled road has increased my commitment to continue to find ways to improve the lives of others within my community.

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 marked 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.

- Robert Frost