Monday, January 3, 2011

Regarding Sick Daughters

I never got the movie that has the daughter getting hopelessly sick, followed by the father going against all odds to discover the miracle cure, leaving the entire family together, happily ever after. Lifetime movie cliche's are somewhat nauseating to me. The reality is that when the typical father's daughter is hurting with sickness, he is at the mercy of providence and the nearest medical facility.

Or just providence.

Personally, these are the moments in life when I'm struck by my relative helplessness in life. They also tend to be the moments that I work to avoid the most.

Our detestation of being helpless begins early. Already my daughter gives me 'the look' when I put the pacifier in her mouth and don't let her do it alone. I think we want to establish that we are something significant, and on some level independent and self-sufficient.

Honestly our desire to set ourselves up as independent would be a humorous hyperbole if it wasn't so grossly futile a dream. From the cellular level, where all it takes to end a life is one cell decide its not going to stop reproducing, up to the cosmic level of our planet depending on insanely precise mechanisms to hold everything in place just so, any concept of independence is sickeningly arrogant.

Which begs the question:

Why does feeling out of control throw me off balance?

I'd laugh if it wasn't so serious an issue.

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