In Robert Frost's The Road Not Taken, a traveller reaches a fork in a wooded path, and chooses the less-worn trail. Walking along, he imagines a future in which he will say: “I took the one less travelled by/And that has made all the difference.” The poem seems to say that independence leads to happiness.

Yet on closer reading, this interpretation seems unlikely. Far from one path being less travelled, both are worn “about the same” after the traveller's passing. The path becomes less travelled only in the traveller's imagination, as he dreams of a moment “ages and ages hence”, implying that independent thought leads to happiness. To me, the poem suggests that we often ascribe meaning and purpose to arbitrary decisions.

At a conference recently, I heard a graduate student ask a professor to describe the choices that led to his career success. I smiled when the professor replied that many of his key decisions were determined by chance. The student seemed surprised, but to me it made sense. Unlike Frost's traveller, the professor was honest about the role of chance in his life.

As I begin a new year of faculty applications, I must write a research plan. In this short essay, I have to describe the course of my past research as well as of future work. Reflecting on past decisions relating to my research direction, I find myself in the position of Frost's traveller, trying to ascribe meaning and purpose to the machinations of fate. My career path owes an awful lot to chance.