"I wish they would have tried that on me." I was watching the news (again) and some young Asian woman was attacked. In another news segment a Muslim Woman had her Hijab pulled off her head. Every day there is ugly happening to people who don't deserve it (who deserves what I don't know). We watch these events and think what we would have done if we were there. We say things like "If I was there, I wouldn't let them get away with that." We believe we would act either as a hero in an ugly situation or as vengeance where it is needed. We even envision our daughters getting hurt, raped or killed and we say "if anyone hurt my kids, my wife I would kill them." Why do we think like this? It is like we are tempting or daring something to happen. Something terrible to happen to someone we love just so we can show that we would do violence to someone. Now the is some messed up way of thinking. The truth is we really don't know how we would react in some situations. Sure we want to believe we would be the morality in an ugly happening. We would want to be the person who stands up to wrong. I wish I knew how I would react as well.
A friend of mine says we all have a certain number of wishes and we tend to waste some of them. Like when we are wishing for a matchstick so we can light our cigarette; "Man I wish I had a lighter. Geez I wish I had a dollar." He says why wish for the little things, you could be using all your wishes? Same thing, why wish for bad stuff when you could be wishing for good things? Why wish to be there when a Woman is being attacked by her jealous insecure husband in the bingo hall? Or what about when a monster was stabbing a young man on the GreyHound Bus? In this situation there was no intervention of the monster. Lot of criticism took place and many not at the scene decried the people on the bus for not stopping the assault. A series of papers were written on the actions taken and not taken in situations - Bystander Apathy. We can never tell what people will do when a bad thing happens.
What is it that we want to prove? Do we want to be the person who runs into a burning house, rescuing the baby from being burnt up? My cousin lost her baby in a fire. The fire was set on purpose at a daycare by a daycare worker. She wanted to be seen as a hero. She ended up killing a little two year old baby. The daycare worker got off and was not found guilty of setting the fire but everyone knows. So this person wished for bad things to happen so they could react. Instead of just wishing they went and did the bad thing.
So I have no visions of being hero for some unforeseen bad thing. Bad things happen all the time, no need to wish for them. If you really want to be a hero, do something. There are hundreds of things to do; donate blood. Can you imagine the life you literally save when you donate blood? Donate food at a food bank. You could be saving someone from going hungry, most likely a child. Volunteer to help out somewhere. Become friends at the local New Comers agency. Make friends with an Indian. They would like to meet new people I am pretty sure. No need to wish for bad things to happen just to show you can do bad back. We all believe we are capable of doing justice (what ever that means) to injustice.
There is a belief in our community/culture that we all have power. Who knows you could have the power to make things happen. So when you say to your child "don't play on the counter you are going fall and break your leg." We say "don't say it like that because you might have the power to make it happen." Your child will end up falling and breaking their leg. I bet some of you have felt that you had the power of foresight, haven't you? You were thinking of a song, a movie and next thing you know, it's there on the tv, on the radio. You do have power. So use your power. Just use it for good things to happen. Like a cool tune on the radio. A good wish for your friend to visit. Wish for your Mom to win bingo if she is a bingo player. There are many good things to wish for rather than bad and sad things. So here's hoping you don't waste all your wishes on bad stuff or using your power on bad stuff.
Just a post script to the last notion of having the power to make things happen. I had an operation when I was about 36 or 37. It was one of those "snip snip" operations, a vasectomy. I told colleagues about my decision. This one fellow, an Elder told me I shouldn't do it. He said "what would happen if your son died, not to replace him or anything, but there is the possibility." Turned out my Son did die, he of course killed himself. So not sure if the fellow foretold it. Still what he said was not a good thing to say. I know in our community, the Indian community there are some things which are not spoken about, but I don't know what they are. I do know but usually it's after I am told. So I say again, why wish for bad things to happen? If you are going to wish, let it be good things.
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