and their cumulative effects
At my age, the joke about “getting old is not for sissies” has just become a mantra used for comic relief. Getting old is NOT for sissies. Things may slow down, and you may be fortunate enough to have a plan in place…
…but that doesn’t stop the challenges. Even transhumanism won’t stop the challenges of growing old. You can replace all the malfunctioning parts, forever, and then you will confront the specter of infinite dissatisfaction, impatience, or boredom.
There is no perfection at any stage. There are always decisions to make and challenges to face, no matter how rich or well-positioned, or how directly you are connected to your bliss. Born again Christians still face challenges. Just because you’ve “got it all” doesn’t insure your life is going to be slo-mo and soft focus. There are no “get out of ‘jail’ free” cards in life.
But it’s all worth it. And that’s part of the trouble. People begin to cling to these corporeal lives and are fearful of …. well, everything. At least that’s the way it’s looked these last two years.
I picture the boomers, with their lives planned out, everything in place to relax and enjoy old age, grandchildren, good food and wine, a comfortable home….and then, covid. And without another thought, everyone folds up the social piece, hunkers down in the comfortable cave and gives up. In the name of “safety.”
At this point, they are ready to sacrifice their children and grandchildren for their own safety.
Common sense has flown.
But it doesn’t work. There is no safety.
There is no real safety except in eternal life in heaven, so nothing can really scare believers — well, the dentist. And we’ll get to that in a minute, because, believe it or not, that’s where this started: thinking about the ruination of the physical machine — because people of faith have a faith in eternity, eternal life with their God, and therefore, while they are committed to living as well as they can, caring for their family and others, they are not as fearful of dying as is someone with no faith at all.
That is, of course, why tyrannical regimes always try to destroy faith first. Because threats are not as effective with people who are not scared to die.
But the majority of people are scared of death. It is the ultimate great unknown, and it haunts us as soon as we are aware of it. For many people, their entire lives are lived in fear of disease and death. For others it is hardly a thought. Live life fully and with integrity and be “ready to meet your Maker” at the end.
But what if you don’t believe in a “Maker?” If you expect nothing at all at the end? Then you will cling to this physical reality every way you can. Because it’s what you know. And that beats what you don’t know. Most times.
But sometimes what you don’t know is the most important part, and that’s the part you have to take on faith.
Pragmatists who cannot see beyond the empirical proof of everything have no way of seeing any “evidence” of God.
The simplest evidence of God is in the ongoing renewal of natural life. It is not entirely explained by evolution either, but that is a way bigger subject than we want to tackle today.
Just the miracle of children is proof of God. A couple years ago there were a few billboards around us, (here in the South, where we “cling to our religion …”) that were a simple photo of a beautiful infant, and said, “Proof of God.”
It was enough. “Science” or not, children remind us of the miraculous. They bring us right down to earth in wonder. Especially infants, who are helpless and depend on us. They instinctively reach out to us, confident in our greater strength.
It is humbling. And terrifying too. That awesome connection and trust. It is like our connection to God.
A belief in God, however, is considered the realm of the un-read, unsophisticated, needy simpletons. Literati and glitterati don’t need that. They have “science” and sense, and know that humans are in charge of it all. That our future is in our own hands, and Elon Musk is going to take us to Mars, to set out from there to — space.
Just like the sci-fi we’ve all known and loved. That is the secular hope for the future.
And that may very well be how it unfolds.
Fifty years ago, I would have signed up for that option. Gotten right in line, in fact. (I’ve aged out, or I still might!)
But that requires years of commitment. And 50 years ago, I didn’t plan to have children. I believed in the population “science” of Paul Ehrlich, and Malthuse, and jokingly “gave” the two children I never planned to have to some Christian friends of mine. I meant it, too – I had plans, and I figured I was too selfish for children. I gave them my “two child coupon.”
More than a decade later, when I had a child myself, I found out that a child opens that selfishness up in ways we can’t possibly understand without them. It opens everything up. And you can see how some of us might believe in a God.
Many “modern” people see children as I did in the early 70s. I’ve actually heard them say the same things I did: that it’s “irresponsible” to add more humans; that the earth is poisoned and they wouldn’t bring children into it – products of our education system, run by my intellectual fellow Sixties alum, who didn’t find God so they decided to be nehilist marxists …
.. creativng waves of self-aware hedonists who believe “for the good of all” means their way. A generation which creates avatars of themselves and feel that children are often a nuisance, not proof of anything, and can be picked and chosen at will.
Oh, and they are better raised in herds. So every child is perfect and compliant.
There is also the new trend to not have natural children. Not when you can plan it all out, juggle vitamins and DNA adjustments and plan your birth experience. Natural childbirth is icky, and difficult, but, if you must, at least have perfect progeny. Keep the genepool pure for the greater good.
Look at this article I stumbled on today: here
The medical staffers around this woman realized it was going to be difficult to get full term with these twin boys. And that life with “disabled” children was going to be even more difficult. So they encouraged her to abort them, to the point of harassing her.
But her gut says, “wait.” And sure enough, the ultrasounds keep looking healthy. Even so, the doctors and nurses are all pounding abortion, “for the good of all.”
That is what our medical community has come to now. It is so much of a business that they would encourage a mother to abort otherwise healthy looking twins. Putting possible law suits over the rights and choices of the mother? Putting dollars over decency? What happened to the Hippocratic Oath? What happened to “first do no harm”?
All she wanted was to give them a chance, and so she made choices along the way and stood her ground…her gut.
Yes, they did each have an issue, due to their early water break – but they appear to be fine. Two little lives that an industry wanted to just write off.
So, now we are where I set out to be: the industry of health.
Where it interfaces with the fear of death.
(And perhaps even world politics.)
But let’s just look at fear of death again — we have a society that considers mankind to be in control of everything. Everything including our health and longevity, and who gets to enjoy what. Oh, and the “quality” of life. Most humans alive today have been exposed to the idea of being able to “fix” everything, to the point where the elite believe they can just keep buying the pieces they need. Literally.
So, the idea that a virus, something you can’t see coming, or do yoga to prevent — could kill you? That hasn’t occurred to a lot of western boomers, for example. Or millenials, with their laissez-faire lives.
And it has people rattled. So rattled they took life-altering experimental chemicals to stave it off. They didn’t question it.
We’ve done it all our lives. I’m 72. I’ve grown up in a world where you threw drugs at everything,from our first smallpox vaccination in elementary school. We had to have it to enter. Because it worked. It had been carefully tested for years. Then there was “measles, mumps and rubella,” so we didn’t have to “suffer the childhood diseases,” and their subsequent side effects. All of which was inconvenient to working mothers and teachers unions.
Inconvenient. Modern people despise inconvenience.
But the industry got even more ambitious and saw the money to be made…..they could create perfect children, get thanks, and get rich. So, the last generational waves have been treated to a pharmacopea of “preventive medicine” and we have a plethora of wonky “side effects” to show for it, too — but again, let’s not dive down that rabbithole right now. Let’s just accept that we’ve accepted it all.
So a lot of people didn’t question the treatment format, because, like many people said, we got vaccines for everything, to travel, to go to school. It didn’t set off any alarms. But “experimental” should have set off alarms. And “emergency use only” should have, too. Then, when you found out the pharmaKings weren’t liable for anything that happened as a result of this “cure….”
…none of that got people’s attention.
It’s like the hundreds of ads for pharmaceuticals and their rapid fire list of “possible side effects.” The last of which is often “death.”
But, hey, a life without psoriasis….and only $16,000 to $65,000 a year….possibly death, but very clear elbows.
THIS is what we’ve come to. You can buy the level of your life and health. Sign here. We will fix it all.
Except when they’ve created the monster they are “fixing.” Then they are actually making it worse. By choice.
And people waited in line to do that.
I can’t say I haven’t taken something without considering the “rare side effects,” even signing off responsibility for the “black box” drug I injected for two years to grow bones. It actually did. It was one of the ones that worked.
It also cost $1000/month and 12 years later I am suffering one of the “rare possible side effects.”
The trip to the oral surgeon. The result of the unconsidered “yes.” The signature. Shooting myself up with godknowswhat every day, to grow better bones on my then half-century old body. We had good insurance and I “didn’t think about it.” I read about the “possible rare side effects,” of course, but….
….the bad parts will never happen to us! That’ll be someone else.
Except when it isn’t.
Life is never without a challenge. And it doesn’t stop just because we are old, or enlightened, or saved or wise. It doesn’t even stop no matter how much money or how little you have. No matter how powerful you are and how many younger body parts you can attach, there is — as the lovely Roseanne Rosannadana used to say — “always something.”
And, all of us are going to die.
So why the fear?
I am ranging around with any number of the health anomalies of a septuagenarian, and God could take me any time. Like everyone else, I’d like that “taking” to be magical and painless, but life hasn’t been, so I don’t know why I’d expect that! But I don’t fear it.
I am thankful for every day. Even the ones like today, when my mouth is swollen and my jaw hurts.
But, I am not so fearful of losing these days that I would be willing to be jabbed with an experimental drug. Not any more. I’d just as soon die from the long term natural results of all the wild life choices I made over the years. Until then, grasping for silken ladders and magical rescues …. nope.
Everything you ever do is a choice. You pay for some of them later, even if you thought you skated through. Agatha Christie said it best, “Some sins have long shadows.” So be it. At least make sure you give those sins some consideration at the time you choose them.
Because you can get “death” from some of those psoriasis cures.
But don’t be so scared of death that you’d do anything at all to stay vertical. Sometimes that choice is worse than the other. Compromise for the sake of something resembling “safety” isn’t always the way either.
My son and I have a conversational shorthand that is “one bad choice.” Because one bad choice can cascade into a multitude of “unexpected consequences.” One bad choice can put you on the wrong road for years. One bad choice can make you homeless thirty years down the road, or even worse.
The unseen road. The one you walk on faith.
I’ve watched those long shadows over the years. I’m glad this one just involves teeth.
Live well and fearlessly. It’s all we can do.