Risk-Taking

I posted a poem on my LJ blog a few minutes ago, but it, and the article in The Atlantic that inspired it got me thinking once more about how we seem to have become a risk-averse country and why I am not, or am no longer risk averse.

It comes down to this.

Life. Is. Risky.
Embrace the Risk.

Forget terrorists and criminals, other drivers, smoke and fire, floods, and all the things we think we've protected ourselves from, with border security, seat belts, police, fire fighters, smoke detectors, insurance, medicine, etc. It goes back to the Cosmo Moment.

When the doctors started talking about meds that would lower the risk of a cardiac dissection (not prevent it), I started realizing it was all about risk management, and that got me thinking about how much we emphasize safety and the price we pay for emphasis. I'd rather be free than safe.

And part of being free means taking risks. That's one reason why my daughter went to India as a high school junior with my blessing--it was a huge risk for her in all kinds of ways, but she knew it would change her life (and it did). For myself--I submit manuscripts--believe me, the failure of rejection is a very real condition for a writer, but if you don't submit, you certainly never will be published. Mind you, I'm not running back into a burning building for a kitten, but I do intend to go for a ride in a glider one of these days (although I don't think I've got the guts to jump out of a plane and skydive).

I don't worry about playing it safe because I know there is no such thing as 100 percent safety. I'd rather Live.

The Cosmo Lesson

This post's title has nothing to do with the magazine, and everything to do with one of my favorite movies--"Moonstruck." Olympia Dukakis has this wonderful line. She's sitting in the chair in the living room after she's had a dinner out by herself and met a man she does not have an affair with. Cosmo, her husband, comes home from the opera, where he's been with his inamorata. He walks into the living room and Rose, Olympia Dukakis's character, says, "Cosmo, you're gonna die." There's a pause and he says, "Thank you, Rose."

That's pretty much what the diagnosis of Marfan did for me, once I'd gotten over the panic of discovering that my child was mortal (not something parents accept easily), and once I'd gotten over anger of the "why is something else happening to me" variety(I have a chronic condition that was diagnosed more than a decade before the Marfan's, and a few years prior to this diagnosis I had a major DVT--blood clot--in one leg).

Yup. I'm gonna die. One of these days. One way or another, it is going to happen.

So you know what? While I'm here, I'm going to live, and I'm going to enjoy it.

I don't gorge, but I eat good food without worrying about a little bit of fat, a little bit of sugar, or a little bit of salt. I definitely eat dessert.

I'm no couch potato, but I do yoga because it keeps me grounded and take walks so that I can see what's going on in the world around me. I garden because I like playing in the dirt and having the freshest possible vegetables right outside my door.

I do save money for retirement and I don't go on spending sprees. But I don't deny myself trips to places I want to see, or books I really want to read, or classes and conferences on writing.

Most of all, I try to keep my eye on the things that truly matter: my family, my work (writing), my community. And I try not to take anything for granted.

Because I am a Marf? Maybe, or maybe because I'm human. Death and taxes may be the only two sure things, but we all know when our taxes are due. We don't know our ultimate deadline.