How Robert Frost Can Change your Life
- Geordie Coles
- Oct 5
- 5 min read
Updated: Oct 6
By Geordie Coles
“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;”
My two roads were presented to me by a man called Derek. It was noon and I was meandering around the Old Course, my ‘yellow wood’, in a slightly delirious fug. Delirious why? Well, a few things. A heavy night before, which is a usual excuse for us students. The not so usual excuse is that morning I then had to drink a mandatory pint for a game; then I stupidly lost another game and had to go to The Jigger Inn, and this was all pretty queasy stuff considering it was before the midday hour. Yet, what consumed me, most importantly, crushingly, was that eternal weight. That ten-tonne weight on one’s shoulders that you should be doing work when you are not.
Now, this is quite an irregular morning for me. But, regardless, there I was, striding up Golf Place, half paying attention to the pros beside me on the course — all eager, hungry, driven for that behemoth Dunhill cup — as I too tried to mirror their motivation by beelining straight for the Classics library on Butts Wynd. Yet, I was once again foiled, having to stop and see the Aussie Cam Smith putt in for birdie, right where he won the open not three years before — I couldn’t do anything but stop! So, as I stopped and stood and stared, so too did a man. And you’ve seen this sort of man before.
Mid to late 70s, evidently one of the St Andrews old guard, he would have known the town when it was a Scots university for Scots sort of thing. He was tucked up in a weather-worn windbreaker which had evidently seen its fair share of action on the links, and which directed the gaze to his face. His bonnie face: rosy cheeks, greying-white hair protruding from quite a few spots and going in every which way like an old horse brush – but in an endearing way — and a stern face. Stern for he was muttering some incantations, said with what I thought was an Irish lilt, directed towards Smith and the other golfers on the green, “Easy does it, just a bit to the left”, willing them to get their ball in the hole not necessarily out of support for the players themselves but in a desire to see a victory for the game of golf itself.
Smith got the putt. “You’ve played this course quite a lot, haven’t you?”, I started up the conversation, inquisitive of his focussed intent on the game. “Oh, yes, more times than I care to mention”, friendly, soft-spoken, Irish lilt confirmed as well. We start talking about the game, naturally. And after five minutes conversation about this and that, around the time one thinks of shaking hands and ambling off, he invites me in for a drink to his club,The St Andrews Golf Club, right behind us. Here is Mr Frost’s own experience in a very small, East Neuk way. Here the old chap gives me my two roads: a drink, or the Classics Library. In a state of inertia as Aeschylus beckons me and I can hear my Mum saying stranger danger, in the moment I decide to…wait, hold on. Stranger danger? Really, Geordie. You’re a university student now, I say to myself, pull yourself together. “So, what’s it going to be then?” says the old boy; having decided I can generally choose a bad egg from a good one and after a few more Boris-esque mumbles I blurt out “Sure, I’d love to!”
With a pleased smile, pleased for the company, he proffers his hand: “I’m Derek by the way”. I do something similar with my name. We step into his quite smart club and what follows is the reason why I realise Robert Frost, the great 20th Century American poet, got it right; but more of that later. Derek asks if I’d like a beer, my stomach churns: “A coffee would be fantastic thanks”. As we sit down with our mugs, what ensued was a fascinating life description of an earnest, hard-working bloke — what one might call an extraordinary ordinary — who was equally interested in what I had to do. Growing up in Belfast, Derek fondly remembers watching Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation, and spoke of a turbulent time in The Troubles as a postman. He spoke of the danger and “the smell of car-bombs that had exploded a few hours before, which caused quite a stench each morning”, and because of this he left with his wife for St Andrews in 1972.
He spoke of St Andrews then and now; of his own golfing victories, which were imprinted on sizeable trophies sitting behind me; of the terrible loss of his wife just before the turn of the century; of the success of his grandchildren; of discipline; of courage. In a change of mood he gleefully told me about seeing the musical ‘Tina’ at The King’s Theatre with his second wife the other day in Glasgow, which he loved. He too asked me questions about my own life, but I hadn’t had the sort of experience to match his responses just yet.
After an hour, I went on my way. We exchanged details and a short walk suddenly took me back into the throng of central town; seeing many youthful faces such as my own, who probably had spent that hour productively. Yet was my time spent with Derek unproductive? Maybe, maybe not.
When ‘The Road Not Taken’ was written in 1915 by Frost, he was faced with many crossroads — some good, some bad. He had moved to England in 1912 to kick start his literary career, then at the outbreak of WW1 he moved back to America receiving great acclaim for his poetry — a productive, successful path travelled. On the other hand, Frost wrote the poem for a friend he met in England, Edward Thomas, who once complained about the path they took on a woodland walk. Thomas took a certain path and enlisted in the army: he was then killed two years later in the Battle of Arras. The message of Frost’s poem isn’t that you will necessarily achieve great success if you take the path less travelled, it is that you are opening yourself up to new, adventurous possibilities if you do. And although our crossroads are certainly not the same as Thomas’s, the principle of choosing is still the same. On our scale, we might achieve success or failure in our untravelled path — but at least we are testing ourselves and gaining new experiences.
Now, this isn’t open season to do something really stupid because not many people have done it. And nor is it wise to constantly take the road less travelled — like taking a quantum module when your major is Classics. But every once in a while, if you take the road less travelled, you might find yourself in a fascinating, irregular scenario, even if it means forfeiting an hour of work. Frost made the big decision to go to England, but the road less travelled doesn’t always have to be life changing; it may besmall. Perhaps going a little further on the Fife coastal path, attending asociety you might not usually go to or even accepting a coffee from a nice Irishman.
So, when you are next faced with two roads, allow yourself, with due caution, Mr Frost, and Derek in mind, to follow these words:
“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.”
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