optimizing your odds
Janet Kuypers
1/3/17
When bad news comes, do you run away.
After a life threatening blow, do you just give up.
Or do you smile, and find a way to get ahead.
*
My friend Warren, bless his soul, he’d play songs
I wanted to cover in our band, and not just more
Stevie Ray Vaughan. He’d drive in a car with me
for three hours to be be in a radio show interview.
He’d play guitar at my wedding. And when
my friend Warren, bless his soul, contracted ALS,
his smile never faded. He’d go on group walks
to get money to look for a cure, and even when
the ALS intensified and his muscles failed him
they got him a wheelchair and a voice box
so his thoughts could sound like Stephen Hawking.
His high school even planned their reunion
at his favorite bar, and at McDivot’s the women
still flocked to him, and not skipping a beat,
Warren would still flatter every woman he saw
with his Stephen Hawking voice, and everyone
that night left happier, just for knowing him.
His desire to live, and more importantly,
his friendly demeanor, made every uphill battle
seem like a it was no effort at all,
even like you were seated, leaning back,
and letting the wheels take you anywhere
you needed to go.
*
And every single one of us, all of our lives,
are never prepared for the struggles we face.
But I have learned, and you can too,
that we can still win over impossible odds.
And sometimes, sometimes we don’t have control.
But it’s the same thing as driving a car,
of letting those wheels take you
where you need to go.
We don’t know how all the gears work in that car,
but we trust it, and we have the same trust
as every other driver on the road.
And sometimes, sometimes we give up control,
knowing it’s for the best. We get on an airplane
and trust the pilot, we sit in our seats,
insert the seat belt latch ‘til it clicks us in,
place our seats into an upright and locked position
and give up control. Even for us control freaks,
we know we can’t do everything on our own.
And lucky for us — once we give up a little
control, well, look at all the places we can go.
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