Life as we know it

I thought of maternity. Maternity as a subject for this column, don’t get me wrong. And then besides every single thing we could discuss in the future about this gift and miracle, I thought of something bigger- life. Is ironic how everything is a cycle. Some people plan having a kid, some don’t. I believe it shouldn’t be treated as a business deal, as an investment, as a contract, as a time waste. We are talking of a human being, which is more sensible because it comes to life totally depending. It depends on its family, on people, the baby can’t make it alone.

So when you think about it, life itself and maternity, it is also a social effect. You NEED other people to live those first months, maybe those first years while you make it to independence. Heck! You need people all your life. Remember Wilson, the volleyball that became famous on Cast Away, as Tom Hanks character needed something to talk to and he created his friend out of imagination. That scene wanted to show that we all need a friend; we all need somebody because our nature is a social one. But I came to discuss life and how everything connects together- based on two testimonies.

So here’s how it goes, and feel free to disagree or discuss this. You meet someone, but that someone may be or not may be your ideal partner or a person that fits healthy standards in a relationship like respect, trust, love, commitment, etc- and then you get together. You may believe on waiting for sex or not, but then comes sex, at some point, and depending on the protection and your health options and rules- and also depending on the Murphy law where plans can change- you might get yourself in pregnancy. And then you have life in you, that if everything goes alright you get to see after 9 months. The perfect stranger that you consider yours is in you but now gets out and becomes parts of life. Then the baby is alive, but not by its own. And then it grows, passing through a lot of things, right or wrong, decisions and what you saw as a gift of life, it turns to be a life of its own. But what is life for that creature? When do you consider yourself alive, when your parents have you? Is that the rule? Could it be that many people fall into a routine of the mass and become only part of a system without ever considering what they are, and what lives mean to them? Are they living dead people?

Certainly, life is something relative and objective where you can get to chose what it is for you. But do you ever consider yourself grateful for it? What happens or what does it has to happen for you to wake up and understand that the only thing that we have assured physically is death. This week two stories, two second birthdays where celebrated. A girl, that on a 10th of July of 1995 was reborn again. She died for 30 minutes and she saw a tunnel and an angel. And that’s a complete different column when we analyze if we are selfish enough to think that we are the only “thing” in this world; if we “operate” by pure coincidence and what God has to do with everything. God deserves many columns, and has a lot to do with this theme (for me, you may defer) but we’ll discuss that another day. She died, and had to go through another operation on aJune 25th of 2001, and also on July 29th on 2005. Many dates, many opportunities. But certainly, the first one was the most incredible experience, a wake up call, she lives everyday thinking that she has a mission and that she could die tomorrow. What a way to live right? Does she sins by thinking she can die or by having it too present? Did it take a near death experience to see it? Was it worth it?

If flirting with death may give you life, a “shake”, not an adrenaline rush (like people who live by death in drugs and danger) then so be it. I believe is better to feel life more because of something, that to live without thinking anything at all, or thinking only of yourself. And then we go back to the cycle. We all need people but we seem to think that they need us, or that they want to use us, or after having a chosen few we neglect others which need to be remembered that they are also important. Wonder why so many suicides? Isn’t that a sign that someone needs to rethink what life is? What about when someone tries to take your life? Could that be a wake up call or you come back to life with vengeance? Another story of a second birthday this week was about that. The first one was because of an illness. The second story is about a guy that tried to kill this person. When asked- he could only say- “if I had to go through it again to feel what I felt, the Grace of God, I wouldn’t think it twice”.

Can you say that today? What do you believe life is? What’s your definition? What are you doing today that will make you a better person or that will help another person’s life? Have you thanked God or anyone, have you told a person you know that has battled death, that you’re happy there with you now. How can we ever analyze any theme without thinking of who you are and how you appreciate what you have? So who are you? I’m eager to know. What makes you who you are, what experiences have marked you? Some scars will never go, and for this two people and their testimonies I can assure you that every time those scars appear in a mirror, they become a reflection and a reminder of what we need to say everyday- THANK YOU. Is a need to scream, thank you for a second chance. You don’t need to go through this to start today. And for those who have had similar near death experiences, by sickness or because of other people that play with life, I’m so grateful that you’re here.

Stop!

“Stop!”- hard breathing. “Stop, just stop it please!”- the sound of mercy; words that scream from the middle of our lungs when we are in different situations we hate. Loneliness, in the middle of a fight, in the middle- in between- the fine line of saying no we sometimes don’t cross for pity or fear. In words of the popular series now movie Sex and the city, “Carrie” says: “It’s incredible how we are eager to write our vows, but we don’t take the time to write our own rules”.

It’s been a week of thinking, of stopping, of daring to listen what others have to say. In a bus, the middle age man that was discussing with his buddies that a women was with a man that cheated on her, but that because he brought in the money she “had” to endure it. It was confusing. Either he was criticizing women that stayed with a man that cheated for money, or he was justifying it. And just as I was thinking that it was a good thing to analyze, two young women where passing by and the chuffer slowed downed. The group of men just dares to comment out loud, near me: “wow man, if the chuffer has slowed down, they must be extremely hot”. And they just followed them with their eyes, like if they could have saved a picture for a future exercise of imagination.

In other story, a middle age women that has to confront once again three men, which she dated on the same Summer, which are possible fathers of her daughter that is getting married. “Mamma Mia!”- I thought the plot was the reason for that name, but no, is a song, and it’s rather cool that is the song related to her feeling all over again after seeing them there after 20 years. The girl invited the possible fathers after reading her mom’s diary, which described sex as “three dots …”. Anyway, they were getting married and both were 20 years old. One of the possible fathers was rather mad that they were rushing. The groom said to her: “don’t you get it, I was ready to explore the world, with a spirit to travel to do 1000 things and I putted it on hold for you”. In the end, she said (bride to be): “you shouldn’t put on hold anything, let’s explore the world together, we’ll postpone the wedding”.

And then last but not least, abusive relationships. A 13 year old girl had a boyfriend of 17 that was abusive. Her mother knew about it, never suspected it would get that far. She tried to kill the girl that’s coming out of a comma; he killed her mother and her 80 year old grandmother. A boy of 17. Did you hear that, a relationship between a girl of 13 and a boy of 17. Dating violence exist. And of this I can talk and talk a lot, because I’ve always been amused and intrigued by the nature of these aggressors. In relationships, the signals are related to guilt. How much guilt can a girl take for talking to others, for having friends, for correcting something he said, for wearing too much make up, for wearing none, for not getting that cell phone at the second ring, for not “obeying”. How much guilt will that girl take now that her family is partially dead and that her sisters, some small, will grow without a mother? When she forgot how to say no. Could it be she said it but he was too strong, or did he tried to kill her because of it.

“Stop!”- it seems that we don’t take our time to say stop and to say no. You may be getting married tomorrow, or next month. You may be picking the kids today at the nursery. You may be an excellent father. A good boyfriend. You may be next. It seems that we need to take our own advices. We have the ability to analyze 20 relationships around us as strangers, but we cannot get out of ourselves to see the bigger view of the situation. We get trapped in there, like if it would be part of our agenda. One day they scream at us, disrespect us, the other day they are “nice”. What do these stories have in common, that we each face different situations, and we get to make decisions. It’s hard, because we get used to it. It becomes a routine and some psychologist say that most of the times we don’t break up with someone we know we aren’t happy is because we get used to them. “Routine beats love”. Then we have to get out of that routine and say no. Scream today! Say no! To all injustices, to violence, to every time you cry and feel hopeless, for the times your down, for the things you see on the news, for all the things that you wish to buy but can’t afford, for all your sacrifices, say no! Stop it! I need a break! In words of a song of Gloria Trevi: “Ella que nunca fue, ella que nunca fue ella… ella se miró al espejo y se buscó, dijo que sería ella mañana, y mañana nunca llegó.” “She that wasn’t she, she that was never her, … she looked at the mirror, she looked for herself, she said I’ll be myself tomorrow, and the other day she didn’t wake up”. What are you waiting for!

F@iry

Why Fairy Tells?

It started as an idea for a book. We always live with the ilusion that we'll find our Fairy tale. But instead of receiving those beautiful stories we encounter multiple ogre's- not the Shrek type- but really mean people on the way that sometimes makes us believe that we will never find our prince charming, that we won't be happy. I like Sex and the City, a fan, and Cosmo. My girlie side reflects on the freedom of speech on topics that are considered taboo- even if I read them on solitude or if I see them on TV. As I read some quotes I found one very interesting: "We sometimes need to forget what we want to remember what we deserve". Right on! So this space will be a change in the blogsphere, maybe there's people that write like in Sex and the City or in Cosmopolitan. I will deliver analysis of situations that we women encounter everyday, to start a forum and to think on what we go through. I truly believe that we face differences because of our gender, and maybe this will be a brief hope to change and exchange what we go through in order to become stronger. Like I said, prepare. This will hold no taboos. Maybe by seeing what others suffer or what others are facing, instead of laughing at them or being filled with envy- we will give us the chance to live it. To learn.

F@iry