Every day on the way to work, I approach on the bridge the tree-lined shore of Hampton. B____’s family home is somewhere on that shore, looking out at the water. He took me there once to show me where he grew up. And some days I have to look away.
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Why does anyone do it? Leash their lives to someone else’s? Why do we invite that kind of stress, the constant negotiations and terribly fragile vulnerability? What house can contain all the baggage two people can collect?
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Surely we can think of a more efficient way to propagate the human race, especially with today’s technology. A cleaner, safer, quieter way to procreate so we can stay alone. Because isn’t that so much easier? To keep yourself away; the essential you, fenced? No wars, no hurts, no unthinking cruelty, the bash of a limb that wouldn’t have hurt anything had it just not been so cramped and crowded. So why is it not good for man to be alone?
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For that matter, let’s go to the source. Why, God, do you want to be with us? Why, when you’re complete in your own glory, do you insist on opening yourself up to such untrustworthy houseguests? Why do you embrace the unwieldy things we are, all the rejection and unending boundary-pushing? What could you possibly get out of it that would make up for the God-awful messes we consistently churn out like a Ford factory?
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It just seems like everyone is in pain and everyone is drowning. Everybody hurts everybody and where, really, does it end? When friends betray friends and sons assault fathers and lovers leave and children hurt and parents are left and mothers sleep alone – how does the weight of it not crack the earth?
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We can’t seem to keep our hands off. And what hope is there? Why do we bother? And why do you?
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