Benjamin Franklin is known for having once said, "In this world, nothing is certain but death and taxes."
Some of you can only recall a gorgeous, Devilish Brad Pitt uttering that phrase at the conclusion of the painfully slow movie "Meet Joe Black." But trust me, the grey-haired Constitutionalist said it first. (Don't hate me for the gratuitous photo above...he's better looking than Mr. Franklin any day.)
I have been thinking about that notion lately—that nothing is certain, that nothing is guaranteed.
For example, we assume, as growing women, that getting pregnant when we're ready is a guarantee. That it will happen, when we're prepared, and on our terms. Lately, I have experienced a friend who painfully, and patiently, has faced that uncertainty with grace and optimism as she and her husband have entered into the not-so-certain world of infertility treatments and blood tests and hormone shots and implantation. All with the hope against hope that they, like so many, can be assured of a result that goes against all uncertainty in life.
There's no guarantee.
Similarly, a family circumstance has occurred where we all put trust and faith in the judicial system under which we're protected, and hoped, against hope, that there would be a certain outcome. That the evidence, or the partiality of the judge, would reign and the result would be what is logical, rational and, well, guaranteed.
There's no guarantee.
Likewise, I've been faced recently with my own realization that in my own personal search for lifelong love, and therein a future marriage, would come to fruition in due course. The cold, hard and painful truth is that we're not sure. No one can promise that the outcome will result in lifelong happiness—even if one does find what they deem to be lifelong love, a partner forever. People can change, or not, and the life you'd envisioned may not turn out the way you planned. Or, conversely, the life you'd planned may never come to be. And you have to find a way to be satisfied by the life that is—the one that you are currently living. You may actually never find that type of love; it may just not be in the cards for you.
There's no guarantee.
And, quite frankly, maybe that's the hardest part.
If someone told the hopeful couple, trying to conceive a child, that it wasn't going to happen for them naturally, ever, they'd feel more resolute, more comfortable with that fact. I believe that the lack of knowing the outcome, in this case especially, is the most difficult fact to swallow. Those same two people, who wanted so badly to be parents, to conceive and give birth to a child of their own genetic strands and through the natural and most functional of ways, may in fact come to the more restful conclusion if they were just told up front that it wasn't going to happen. I believe, through my conversations with such people, that it is the uncertainty that is the most unsettling.
If it was clear, up front, that the law was the law, and that there was no way to undo that, no matter what efforts you made to the contrary to prove that the proper course of action would be something different, you may be better able to accept that course. To understand that it was meant to be, for good reason, would be easier to identify with, and therefore, would set your mind to rest.
If you knew, upon your wedding day, that the marriage had an expiration date, and that you were going to have a great life for thirty years, but that eventually things would dissolve and unravel, it may be easier to accept when that finally comes to be. And, if it was clear, at a certain age, that you were destined to live alone, and that you best find a way to be satisfied with that, it may not be as difficult to manage each day just not knowing. In a more positive approach, if someone pulled you aside, at a crucial point in your life's search for a partner, that it would happen someday—guaranteed—and that you were charged with just enjoying the station you were in at the time, for now, I'm certain that that level of certainty would grant you a peace inside.
Clearly, I'm wrestling with my own level of uncertainty. And unwillingness to give in to that—I just wish there was a guarantee. Obviously, I want to find that special someone with whom I'm going to spend my life, and I am unhappy with the unknowing that accompanies the process. Evidently, I'm searching for something, and feel that I'd be more resolute with the present, if someone could just guarantee the future.
I'm pretty sure, however, that Ben Franklin was right. The only guarantee in my future is taxes (made certain by my residence in the city of Chicago) and my ultimate death.
Hopefully, I can count on one sooner than the other.
In the meantime, I can promise that I won't give up hoping, praying, wanting and looking.
That much I can guarantee.
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