Beautiful and Crazy

The gist of it is this – it’s beautiful and it’s crazy.

The mistake is thinking that anything in life is linear. One thing doesn’t always lead to another. Life’s a collection of events strung together by string someone found in the junk drawer. The most successful negotiator of life may be, in fact, the person with Alzheimer’s Disease who has no choice but to live in the nanosecond present.

It is the curse of If/Then thinking that drives parents crazy. If I do X, then my child will be Y. Inputs equal outputs. Effort equals results. I had this omnipotent belief in parenting. I was all nurture.

Everything that happened for good or bad would be traced to my action or neglect, my triumph or mistake. How egocentric.

The world revolves around me. I am the source of all right and wrong, each failed grade and missed soccer game, every fight at school, each round of applause, every award for academic performance, every degree, job, marriage, child, and credit rating. I am Mom.

It has been long, hard news to learn that I’m not, in fact, in control of anything. Not my children’s lives, my husband’s nor even my own. If not exactly random, the events in my life and the life of my family are beads on a string. I don’t choose the beads. They just appear.

There are unhappy beads and joyous beads. Gravel and rare jewels. Frantic beads and beads looking at the sun setting on Lake Superior. I am responsible for none of them.

The only thing I’ve ever done is find the string in the junk drawer.