I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how factors influence people. Things we don’t think about often, like birth order, or if you had a pet.  The experiences we have in childhood continue to shape us throughout our lives, whether we acknowledge them or not.

For some people, this is a horrible injustice.  They have suffered from the moment of their birth until they die from one cause or another. Maybe it was genetics, maybe it was environment. What confluence of events was needed to ensure a short or miserable life or both? Karma?  God? Rotten luck?  When people discuss the root causes of social injustice, how much of it is being born into the wrong chance? Why are some lucky to be born beautiful, rich or loved while others are born sick or weak or poor? 

The first chance we have in life is our parents. We don’t pick them,  and for better or worse our lives hinge on their choices. Choice of partner, choice to have a child or not, where they live and what they do to their own bodies. And these choices are dependent upon the choices of their parents and so on back down a long line of chance or divine will, whatever it is you believe.

I think back down the line of cross links in my double helix and wonder which ones came from Scottish sea captains or Jewish refuges, proud Cherokee warriors or  Irish immigrants from famine times.  I didn’t pick them, but they chose me. Because they lived, I live today, thinking about the meaning behind why I get to sit in a comfortable coffee shop and have breakfast while others in the world go hungry or stay tortured on the fringes, barely surviving in a place that is cruel and unwelcoming.

How easily I could have been in that place through no fault of mine other than birth. So much is arbitrary- do we get blessed with beauty? Or struggle to swim to shore? Is it chance or is it written?

 Questions beyond my ability to answer. But maybe these questions will keep me judging everyone as my equal. If we share nothing else, we do share this accident of birth. I am so fortunate to be able to think about life instead of just existing to live. Maybe my fortunes will change, as they do on a dime for many. But at this moment, drinking my warm coffee, I say a prayer to the great creator for the amazing works around me. And I make a promise to do what I can to make this accident of where I come from serve others and make a difference in the world, even if only to one person.