Life is a series of choices. And each of those choices, good or bad, has consequences. If you chose to walk down a dark alleyway in a bad part of town and you get mugged, raped, shot or killed - that’s the consequence of your choice. Sure, in a perfect world where there was no crime and people respected each other you COULD walk down that alleyway without anything happening to you. Even in an imperfect world - you might get away with walking down that alley and nothing happening. Violence is one of the potential consequences you risk when you make that decision.

If you were one of the unfortunate women who believed Ted Bundy was a nice guy, you suffered the consequences of dating or trusting someone you didn’t know was a serial killer. Do you see what’s happening here? Every choice has a consequence. In the world of Physics - every action has an equal and opposite reaction. When we do one thing something else will happen. Sometimes we can foresee the consequences, or at least guess at them - like not wearing a seat belt, driving while drunk, marrying someone with a prison record for violence. Sometimes we hope for the consequences that favor us - buying a lottery ticket, going on a blind date with that person with the average looks but great personality.

Life is all that. When we recognize that we can seek out “experts” or people with more knowledge and experience to help us make more informed choices, then we can feel better about the choice we make, but we still have to deal with the consequences. You can’t get away from it. I pay a mechanic to tell me if a car is worth what the seller is asking. He can say, “Not really,” and I can choose to trust his judgment and not buy the car, or I can take my chances because I think the seller is really being honest. Whatever, I’m the one who suffers the consequence of my action. At least for most of us that’s how it happens. But lawyers have become quite good at convincing us it’s not our “fault” for making choices. If we chose to juggle hot coffee at a drive through window - knowing it’s hot, and we spill it and burn ourselves - then someone else is to blame. Really? If a person picks a doctor who cuts off the wrong leg or arm in surgery (don’t laugh, it happens all the time) they make a choice that has consequences - loss of a leg or arm. But the doctor made choices as well - and they will have to face the consequences of their action.

No fairy godmother, or court, or white knight on a steed is going to be able to undo the consequences of our choices. We may be able to mitigate or reduce the consequences, or work them to our good, but they are still OUR consequences. When I signed up for a class in college and decided half-way through that I wasn’t going to pass I waited too long to drop the class. As a consequence my GPA suffered. Pitching a fit didn’t change the fact it was my choice to wait. But other students around me who did the same somehow figured the university was to blame for not telling them, forcing them even - to drop out. Those were the students who went on to believe the government should keep us safe at any cost, that they were owed jobs, health care, housing, new cars and a life free from pain.

When my mother fell about 10 years ago, and broke her shoulder, the owner of the business where she fell was worried we were going to sue him. I explained - “She was 70 years old, wearing flip-flops that she constantly tripped in at home and knew she should not be wearing. She took a risk, knowing she might fall, and she did. When an elderly woman trips and falls on flat, dry ground because of her choice of footwear, it’s NOT the store owner’s fault.” Choice and consequence. When did we stop believing that we own our lives? When people make decisions based on the reality that they will suffer the consequences and no one will bail them out, then we all benefit. If the banks make foolish decisions, or mortgage companies lend to poor risks - they should suffer the consequences - not the American taxpayer.

If a woman is released on probation from prison with the condition that she is not to get pregnant, or she will violate the terms of her probation and she gets pregnant - then she suffers the consequence and ends up back in jail. However - once back in jail she dies from untreated medical problems. She paid the price and really suffered a major consequence - loss of life. Advocates are angry at the prison - for not rendering timely medical care. The prison will suffer the consequences of their action. The dead girl’s mother is suing. But people don’t understand. If the girl had honored the terms of her parole, she’d still be alive. No one wants to admit we are all responsible for ourselves. And it’s sad sometimes. Sad because we don’t think, sad because we make uninformed or poorly informed choices and those choices come back to haunt us.

We aren’t entirely adrift in a world of chance. Once we’ve made the best choice we can, and the consequence is less than we expected, or totally catastrophic we have one last resort - to make another choice. It is that free will, that ability to learn from our mistakes, to choose to go forward, and to act and act and act until we get it right that makes life worth living. It doesn’t make it easy, but it sure as hell makes it interesting.