FLOGGING THE DOLPHIN (Piece)

You know... there's a question that lingers in the human mind: "Am I accountable for who I am, right now?"

The truth is complicated. Humans cannot resist change - whether in body or in mind. So in a strict sense, perhaps we are not accountable. Yet responsibility cannot be escaped. We are fragile, and to live we must act strong, even while carrying unbearable truths.

From the very beginning - even in the womb - influences shape us. Then, through childhood and adolescence, we are molded by what we cannot control: parents, environment, voices, images, and experiences that plant seeds of value or corruption. Some studies, rather I speculate that forty to sixty percent of who we become as adults is born from those years, when we were still helpless, still innocent.

Tom was no exception. He became a victim of these forces. His story is one of curiosity turned captivity, of innocence bent toward hidden desires. Yet it is not a story without hope. For though he lost himself to what some call self-love, he was not left there forever.