24 Hours

Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine

Destiny was a funny thing. Sometimes in worked in the form of the butterfly effect, a chain of events impacting each other. Other times, however, it just happens.

                I mentioned earlier that I wondered whether or not that knowing a part of the outcome of this system of lives impacts our decisions. It’s a confusing concept to grasp, so allow me to explain it in one word.

                Paradox.

                Still don’t get it? I’ll elaborate. Imagine a man, running from two bad men. The bad men are chasing him down the street, trying to kill him. The man has a head start, but he reaches a fork in the road.

                Let’s assume that somehow, he knows he’s going to die because of the choice he makes here. He knows that no matter which path he chooses, the bad men will catch him. It’s not that all the paths are the wrong path; in fact, only one of them is wrong. But this man knows that he will pick the wrong path.

                So instead of going, he sits down in the middle of the intersection and waits for the bad men to find him. He knew it wouldn’t matter what he did, for he was going to die.

                But hadn’t his knowledge of the future affected the outcome? If he hadn’t known he was to die, he would’ve chosen a path. He might have lived.

                This was how I felt.

                I was stuck in an infinite hold, a void of no return. I knew I was going to die in twenty-four hours, and with no doubt of it whatsoever. I pictured my corpse stuffed in the closet, or lying on my bed. Dead. Maybe there wouldn’t even be a mess.

                But I knew that no matter which way I went, I was to die.

                In fact, weren’t we all in this position? We know we can die at any minute. We know that. But aren’t most of us like the man in the example? Didn’t we just sit down and wait for death to catch up to us? We didn’t make a decision. We just waited. Waited until the day we fell asleep and never woke up.

               It truly was a paradox. We couldn’t win. It was a rigged game right from the start.