About ten years ago my closest friend was killed when a huge pine tree crashed down on her while she was riding her bicycle through a forested area in Oregon. I look at her high school pictures now and marvel at how young and beautiful and full of joy she was then. She had gone eagerly into her adulthood, expecting a full life filled by her work, her friends, and her handsome husband, with whom she hoped to have children. Instead she died at age 27, the victim of a freak accident of nature.
Life is like that.
It can be unexpectedly crushing or just as easily, full of surprising turns of happiness. At the bottom, what each of us knows, as a human being on planet Earth, is that the things that happen to us often do just happen. We are weak and puny when compared to the often violent forces surrounding us in nature and in our society in general. Perhaps this is why strong-willed, healthy individuals are driven to try to control their lives in at least small ways. Perhaps this is why we must try to control our lives-in order to survive in a world filled with unexpected events.