6/19- Steroids and Two Acts of God

Jaimie and I got into a fight last week and she blamed it on the steroids. I was like sweet, does that get me out of trouble? Yes, it’s my steroids. That’s why I was on my cell phone when you were talking to me.

The steroids.

I had a dream last night that I was in auditorium and there was a surprise guest speaker and that surprise guest speaker was Ted Cruz. He was giving a speech on personal responsibility and my first thought was, haven't I suffered enough? I was excited to ask him questions about how my getting cancer fell into his view on personal responsibility but I woke up to use the bathroom and never got the chance. #sad

I think it’s funny that there is a legal definition of an act of God. Airlines, insurance companies, they put language in their contracts that factor in for the the fact that some out of control, unforeseen shit might happen, and they don’t want to be responsible for it.

The way I see it, I’ve been a part of two acts of God. The first one was two years ago next week. I was buying a house in Charleston. The house was perfect. Off Savannah Highway, a mile south of Avondale. It was small and cute and there was a place to roast oysters in the back yard. The was a little covered patio to sit and watch the rain. There was a tree stump. The tree had been cut down but the stump had been preserved and even though I never would have done it, I pictured myself sitting there on that stump, enjoying my yard. Like some sort of suburban woodland creature.

The timing of the house, however, had always been a little off.

I had been a finalist for what I thought was my dream job and not gotten hired by one single vote.

One. Single. Vote.

It was a devastating blow and I decided the best way to deal with that emotionally was to purchase property. I might not be able to work in this town, but damn it if I won’t pay a mortgage here.

Then, five days before I was scheduled to close, a storm came through. Not like a metaphorical storm, but like a literal storm. With thunder and lighting and wind and rain. And that storm ripped the roof off my perfect little house. It flooded, the floors buckled, the ceiling collapsed. A couple of weeks later the owner decided she no longer wanted to sell me the house. Contracts were broken. I sued. She settled.

If legally that was an act of God, then there had to be a reason for it right? If he is all knowing and all seeing, then that storm had to have come through with the specific intention of getting me out of town, setting the stage for me to move Atlanta. Right? Or does an act of God, in the legal sense of the term, mean that it was a completely random event? Void of any meaning other than the ones our weak little minds put on it?

I ask those same questions with the second act of God, my getting cancer. It feels very much like the same set of circumstances. I was expecting one thing, and then boom, out of the blue…a storm…

Whatever the actual answer, I’ve decided to give them both meaning. Why not. Life if more fun that way. Maybe the house and the cancer are both for big reasons- like I’m gonna write a book or a movie and I needed to be in Atlanta to do it and I’m going to get rich and famous and have all my dreams come true. Or maybe it’s small, like the cancer got me on the steroids that got me out of that argument last week with Jaimie. Who knows.

Or maybe it’s nothing. Maybe we hurtle on in this universe toward nothing for no reason whatsoever. Even if that is true, I’ll still be over here, sorting through the evidence, trying to make sense of it all.