The Surprise

From the discovery of the pregnancy until the newborn hopefully becomes old and dies, life is a string of surprises!

Saint Mary was surprised when archangel Gabriel announced to her her pregnancy with Jesus, and every woman in the world, despite her planning and willingness to have a baby, is surprised when she discovers the results of her pregnancy tests.

When the baby makes her first steps, or when her first tooth breaks, the astonishment of the parents is often as big as the one of the disciples when they saw Jesus walking on water or transforming water into wine!

The first word the child utters, mama, papa or some unintelligible mumble, has the same impact, on the parents, as the words of God (Ten Commandments) had on Moses on that famous hill. Even when the child starts pooping where he should, this “unexpected and surprising” change is often an immense joy and an opportunity for celebration. Thus, childhood goes by, full of surprises, bringing a lot of joy to everyone, but especially to the parents.

At around 13 years old, the boy discovers that he became a man and probably a bit earlier, the girl realizes that she became a woman. This discovery is one of the biggest surprises in our lives, especially for girls. Surely it is a source of joy and pride for every teenager. But, because the adolescents ignore their parent reaction to this news, they keep this joy and this pride to themselves (the first habits of not sharing your joys with others start to develop there and then). This new development, once noticed by the parents, brings them this time an equivalent amount of joy and worries. This would be the first of a long series of bittersweet surprises!

The list of surprises in life is very long. Here are some of the happy ones: succeed in high school, earn a university degree, obtain a visa for USA or Europe, win the lottery, wake up in the morning, sleep at night, being noticed by the girl you like, your hemorrhoids healing by themselves, discovering that you don’t shoot blanks, having a natural erection when you are 80 years old, …

From one surprise to another, some happy and others sad, we head firmly towards our biggest surprise. Despite the unquestionable certainty of the inescapable end of every being, the death of someone we know always comes as a huge surprise, painful and sad. We are stunned and we curse, we cry and we blaspheme.

Why do we do that? Here is my surprising discovery: we do that because of the regret we feel when we realize that this surprise (death), from this person, is indeed his last (except if he is Jesus), therefore our lives will be diminished until we find other surprises, from other people. Sometimes we don’t find any substitutes, so we spend the rest of our lives sad and disappointed, or, other times, we decide that the surprises of this life do not interest us anymore, therefore we choose to experiment the ultimate surprise: death or eternal life for the believers!

Finally, we cannot talk about surprises without mentioning the most common and unpredictable surprise of all, marriage. Marriage is a pillar of this surprising life. It starts as a very happy surprise for the bride, the groom, the in laws and the friends. Then throughout the marriage we witness a series of different surprises:

• The happy (I am pregnant with your child)

• The unhappy (I am pregnant, but the doctor said you are sterile)

• The funny (I tainted my hair in orange, my hair dresser said it makes me look sexier and younger)

• The sad (after 20 years of marriage, I never really loved you)

• The disturbing (you are the best lover among all your friends)

• The depressing (I wanted to buy this fur coat, but the card was not working, I called the bank and they said we don’t have enough money, is that true?)

• The scary (I am in love with your mother)

• The even scarier (I am pregnant from your father)

• The libido killing (I cannot sleep without my socks and my pajamas)

• The reassuring – or not (I will “never” leave you)

• The tear breaking – from sadness or joy (I am leaving you!)

• The very disappointing (I am leaving you with your best friend)

Eventually, the journey in marriage finishes with the most unexpected surprise, not really part of the past promise made by the newly wed. Since you believe that you have guessed what the last surprise of marriage is, I will surprise you by not telling you what I believe it is!

Surprise yourself, always!