The W's

When we first enter the world as wet little bundles of flesh, we don't know anything. Not the why, the where, the when, or the how. We don't need to--not yet. All we have, as our big dumb head fall back and forth observing the new world around us, are instructions, buried deep and safely behind our foreheads in the essentially useless matter that makes up our tiny brains. Instructions, with any luck, that will allow us to slowly emerge into the world, develop into beings, that with more luck, can search for answers to those very questions. Like a bending and stretching caterpillar one day hoping to become a butterfly, that useless matter will flower into a mind that is capable of the strongest anger and deepest happiness, the most delicate tenderness and love, and the patience and drive to explore all the mysteries of life.

We are our parent's investment to ourselves. We didn't ask for life, we just got it and knew what to do with it. Maybe our parents didn't want to be alone, maybe they always wanted kids and loved the idea of a family, maybe it was our biology forcing us to find attraction in the opposite sex, maybe we're a mistake. None of that matters, life has no prejudices. Life doesn't judge. One day we'll wake up--graduating high school, entering college, starting a job, getting in an argument, mowing the lawn, moving. Some people never really wake up.

I think the W's can be tricky. The what and where go hand in hand, the why and where, though, are different. We spend our whole childhood asking why: Daddy, why is the sky blue? Mommy, why do you where makeup? Why do I have to where a helmet? Why are people stupid? When we emerge from our childhood chrysalis, the more interesting 'why's' get us nowhere: Why do bad things happen to good people? Why does it always happen to me? Why can't I feel God's presence? Why is life unfair? It's like trying to squeeze juice from a prune, you might get something, but it's never enough, never satisfying.

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