Almost Walking
My daughter is coming up to eleven months old and with the aid of a walker is proudly toddling about the place. It’s wonderful. I’m not sold on the idea that she herself realises how momentous a step this is. To see her standing upright, knuckles white and smile broad, taking uncertain steps with increasing confidence is a great pleasure. Like so many events I am witness to at present it stirs up thoughts about child development, education and the ever-so-slightly-uncertain future that youngsters face.
On thinking about that last sentence I realised that I still, loosely, of course, include myself amongst the youngsters. I suppose this is because there remain so many important decision which affect my life and the life of my family which are made by individuals or groups far away from my influence and in many cases awareness. Not that control is necessary, quite the opposite. To be involved with all of the important decisions in one’s life is definitively impossible. No single person can maintain that number of sufficiently intimate acquaintances. Even if you were to organise a company of persons to undertake the work it would be so vastly expensive an undertaking that I am confident that perhaps only the very wealthiest alive could even consider attempting it. Besides, this is moot, the effort simply isn’t efficient. It is far better to accept that much of life is determined by chance or by others; attention should be focused on dealing with those elements which are within the scope of our control and influence as well as dealing with those that aren’t in a positive manner.
Why positive? Because negative or positive approaches are irrelevant to the decision maker. If you choose to be unhappy about your tax bill, well, the only person who will suffer from that is you. Better by far to be happy and lighthearted, even if you choose to fight such a thing in the most grave manner, do so lightly and without worrying about it too much.
These are some of the thoughts I have had watching my daughter passing the five seconds mark in independent standing. What am I going to do when she can talk?
