Row Home Remembers PRH Life
Coulda!
Woulda!
Shouda!
L
byTony Santini
ife gives us moments which force us to make a choice – decide or do nothing. It’s probably safe to assume that through the course of our lives, we have regretted a choice, a decision or an action not taken. You can pick your preferred phrase – “the path not taken,” “the lesser of two evils,” “a fork in the road.” Each of these metaphors depicts a deciding moment when a choice is required and your sub-
sequent action or non-action, may have lasting implications. My personal favorite phrase is a line from a song by the group, Faces. In the lyric, lead singer Rod Stewart sings, “I wish I knew then what I know now, when I was younger!” Man, oh man, if this ain’t the truth! If I knew then what I know now, there would be things I would have done differently but, keeping this on the lighter side, let me share some of my “woulda, coulda, shoulda” moments. I was a shy kid. People who know
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me now would dispute this but, back in the day, I was afraid to talk to girls. I could have, but I didn’t, and that lack of action means I’ll never know if that little, red-haired girl I liked in fifth grade would have gone out with me. I should have asked her out. What was the worst that could happen? She says no? Instead, I lamented when she danced with another classmate at one of our school dances. Same held true in sixth, seventh and eighth grades. Fortunately, I grew out of that shyness in my late teens
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and, when an opportunity came up to talk to the prettiest girl in the room at a party, I took it and will be married to that same girl for 40 years this September. Other decisions made in my youth explain my aversion to risk. Like any kid growing up in South Philly, you had to learn how to climb fences so you could sneak into your neighbors’ yards to retrieve errantly thrown footballs and pimple balls. This skill involved placing your hands and feet on opposite alley walls, scaling both sides, then leaping onto the fence you were trying to hop. This was easy to do for the skinny, athletic kids. Not so for the short, chubby ones. My attempt resulted in an epic fail that left me with scrapes and bruises on both arms and legs for most of the Summer. An equally painful experience was
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