Ty strikes his best Karate Kid pose! (Anne says he looks like a pink flamingo!)

In my haste to draw conclusions from our ‘near miss‘ at Lake Austin a week ago, I think I may have missed the most important lesson;  the second ‘near miss‘ if you will, or in in the mathematical sense:  ‘near miss squared‘ (the near miss of the near miss).  Sorry, my meticulous nature gets the better of me occasionally!  This occurred as I was relaying the incident to Roger’s great aunt at a family gathering a few days later.

My history of sharing scary kid stories with Aunt Ginger goes way back as we’ve both had terrifying, health-related issues with a child at a young age.  This is the bond we share.  After I relayed the incident,  Aunt Ginger looked squarely at me and stated:  “Well, it wasn’t Ty’s time because IF it WAS, He wouldn’t still be HERE!”   Light bulb!

That’s the take-away . . . as mere mortals we are not in charge!  And Ty’s near miss was a startling reminder of this fact.  Now I know the existence of The Creator, God, is a matter of opinion that is accepted on faith by believers, of which I am one.  But it IS worth noting that our founder’s belief in the equal, natural rights of all human beings forms the moral foundation of our nation.  And so religion, like the Constitution, is just the expression of how we choose to govern ourselves in accordance with that belief.

Benjamin Franklin summarized religion like this:

“Here is my creed:  I believe in one God, the Creator of the universe.  That he governs it by his providence.  That he ought to be worshipped.  That the most acceptable service we render to him is in doing good to his other children.  That the soul of man is immortal, and will be treated with justice in another life respecting its conduct in this.  These I take to be the fundamental points in all sound religion.”

Amen.