Very pretentious sounding, I know. But this is something I've thought about extensively. It is the idea that despite all our intentions to the opposite, behaviors, mistakes and circumstances seem to plague families down through generations.
I am thinking of the firstborn girls who have died in my family. First Laura and then Kady. I am thinking of the woman I know whose allegedly wonderful father cheated on her mother, and she somehow managed to choose a wonderful father for her own children who cheated on her. I am thinking of my own father who I've only spent time with on perhaps a score of occassions in my life. I am thinking how he is so friendly, outgoing...and yet apart. Too independent. Too cocky. Rather prickly. And how I am too independent, too cocky and too prickly, longing for intimacy and connection, yet somehow too proud to go out on a limb to get it. I can think of all these examples and hundreds of others. And you can, too. Because it is out there every day in the lives of everyone we come in contact with. Original recycling. The sins of the fathers.
I believe that there are spiritual laws at work in the universe the same as physical and chemical laws that govern the behavior of matter and forces and atomic particles. Perhaps that accounts for my observations. Perhaps it is karma. Perhaps it is some kind of unspoken programming that occurs. The nature versus nurture question is one that boggles even the most complex of minds, much less a mere genius like myself. We could each in turn dissect my examples and explain them away with cirucmstances or personal choices or just another version of the recurring bad luck raditating from a Las Vegas cooler. However, there is something there. Something cosmic, something powerful, something barely noticable except in hindsight. And we look in wonder, thinking, "How the hell did THAT happen?!?!"
And it makes me think about the tremendous effort it takes to turn the tides of man, to ensure that the cyclical patterns don't repeat. To look at our children and say, "Never them" is the easy part. The hard part is seeing it coming. Knowing how to evade it. How to outflank it. What to do about it when it happens. That, my dear readers, separates the wheat from the chaff. That is what makes a difference in life. Some would call it common sense, but I disagree. There is nothing less common that common sense.
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4 comments:
Wonderfully said, as usual bunnjo. Your intellect seduces, at the same time it alienates. If you want to talk universal principles, have you ever heard that negative attracts negative and positive attracts positive? Life, or fate, or bad luck radiating from a cooler can sometimes be traced right straight back to a decision someone made in their life. I grant you there is chaos in the universe and we are not always responsible for what happens, but we are always responsible for how we react and that is what makes all the difference.
Yeah, I know. But it still strikes me as significant the number of things that recycle through generations. Are each one of them attracting by virtue of positivity/negativity? Is it environment? Is it temperment? Is it God? Who knows. My point is that it is there. :)
Why am I so blessed? Who'd I get that from? Or have I perhaps made good decisions and worked hard to break out of the normal fortune of our lineage? Or... do I just deserve this good life because of my rationality and humility?
ewwww, that sounded bunnyjoish. Now I deserve a curse or something.
It is perfectly acceptable to pride oneself on one's well-deserved good fortune and to bask in the glow of one's accomplishments. Just as long as you remember that there are some who experience undeserved bad fortune as well. In your case, "the dad," I think you have done a good job of sharing your blessings. I am thinking of Ben but there are others. Because of your first kind overture, God was able to work in his life before he came to his judgement day.
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