You Never Know... | A thoughtful entry

Recently I wrote about 2 bus drivers who are in
the military and were going to be laid off from
their civilian jobs in cut backs. In that entry
I spoke about how you just never know why
things happen as they do.

Today I was talking with a friend about this,
and he told me another friend of his was asked,
"If you could go back in your life and change
anything, what would it be?" in a job interview.

A conversation ensued, and he quoted Star Trek,
a series with endless references for this friend
of mine. There does seem to be a lot of wisdom
in the show (even though I haven't seen many of
them myself).

Apparently in the show he was referencing,
Picard was being operated on, and was going to
die because of something that had happened
earlier in his life. He was given an opportunity
to go back and change the outcome. When he
arrived back in present time, he was OK physically,
but wasn't the same man and wasn't the captain of
the Enterprise, either.

When he realized that changing that outcome was
going to have another outcome that he didn't want,
he decided it would be better to have things as
they were, and die if he needed to. Of course,
he didn't die. But the tale was still told, and
a possible point made.

We never quite know what effect one thing will
have on another. Recently I became acquainted
with the following old Zen story, and I think
in short it says a lot about what we perceive
to be good or bad:

A farmer had a horse but one day, the horse ran
away and so the farmer and his son had to plow
their fields themselves. Their neighbors said,
"Oh, what bad luck that your horse ran away!"
But the farmer replied, "Bad luck, good luck,
who knows?"

The next week, the horse returned to the farm,
bringing a herd of wild horses with him. "What
wonderful luck!" cried the neighbors, but the
farmer responded, "Good luck, bad luck, who
knows?"

Then, the farmer's son was thrown as he tried
to ride one of the wild horses, and he broke
his leg. "Ah, such bad luck," sympathized the
neighbors. Once again, the farmer responded,
"Bad luck, good luck, who knows?"

A short time later, the ruler of the country
recruited all young men to join his army for
battle. The son, with his broken leg, was
left at home. "What good luck that your son
was not forced into battle!" celebrated the
neighbors. And the farmer remarked, "Good
luck, bad luck, who knows?"

I am also reminded of a Ray Bradbury short
story called The Sound of Thunder. The
story has a definite take on what it believes
to be the result of a seemingly insignificant
change in the course of events. It is based
on the idea of the Butterfly Effect, the idea
that one small thing can make a big difference.

While these two things are in some way in
opposition to one another the one thing they
have in common is they may just make a person
take a step back and think.

The only thing we have control over in life
is how we react to things...so if we can't
necessarily affect the events in our lives,
at least we do have some say over how we
interact with the results of the events,
and we can consider how what we do might
affect another (somehow I don't think those
who decided to drill in the Gulf did much,
if any, of that).

We can try to control everything in life,
but there truly are so few things that we
can. Most control is an illusion, and a
fragile one at that.

So...along with your hamburgers and hot dogs,
here is a little something for you to nibble
on today.

Happy 4th!