You Never Know

"You never know. You just never know!" This is the phrase that I feel has been echoing in my ears over the last few weeks. You never know when "it" will happen, the "it" being meeting the mythical "love of my life," a.k.a. "soulmate," a.k.a. "the one." I just don't know if it's in the cards for me. 

And every time I say that, "I don't know if it's in the cards for me" I get that echo back from whoever it is I am talking to, "You never know." The phrase then gets followed up with love stories, some that I find pretty inspirational. 

A little known fact about me is that I teach faith formation (Catholic Sunday School) to middle school age children. Lately, it seems the mothers of some of my students have taken an interest in my single life. Many of them assumed I had children of my own, or that I was already married. When I deliver the dark truth that I am actually just a single woman that enjoys teaching their kids, I get met with surprise. And then it comes, "Well, you never know when it will happen! You never know." 

One of the mothers, the spitting image of Joan Cusack, shared with me that she was divorced years ago and remarried. Her daughter is from her second marriage. She was married to her first husband for almost five years. It deteriorated. Her current husband was someone she knew from high school.  They dated in high school, but like most high school romances, it fizzled out. He contacted her years later, when she was fresh from her divorce. They started talking again, but they were long distance.  They started seeing each other. The relationship developed. She relocated for him, got married to him, and now they have been happily married for almost fifteen years. Seeing them interact was seeing best friends in love. "You just never know!" 

The next mother to share her story with me told me about how she was dating a guy who became a drug addict. He had fallen back into drugs and was becoming abusive and controlling with her. One weekend when he was acting crazy, she decided to get out of town on a whim. She was around my age at the time. She went to the airport to catch the first flight out of town as a "stand-by." While she was waiting, she met her current husband. He was 43, had never been married, and had no children. They started talking and eventually dating. Her now-husband was going to move to Japan for work; the plan was that they were going to move to Japan together. At the time, she was not in a hurry to marry and wanted to take her time with him. I was surprised to learn that our priest advised her to relax, live together for a while, and get married when they came back to the U.S. They ended up eloping and had a celebration when they were back in the U.S.  They have now been married for eighteen years. "You never know!" 

So is love in the cards for me? I have no idea. People tell me not to worry. I feel like I'm just floating through life with an open mind and making sure I don't have any more goobers. 

Marathon Man and I are still talking. He's brought up visiting, but I remain skeptical. Until I see him get off the plane and step into my apartment, I won't believe that he's serious about seeing me. I don't know if he's "it." I don't want to get too excited. I don't know if love is in the cards for me. 

But, you never know. 

Nuclear Disarmament

Our trip to Japan took a somber turn with a visit to Hiroshima. Being a lover of history, I wanted to see the city where the first atomic bomb hit and to hear from the people affected by it. Little did I know the emotion I was about to experience.

Growing up in school, three things about Japan in World War II were ingrained in me: (1) they believed that they were a master race during the War; (2) they attacked us first at Pearl Harbor so we became involved in the war; (3) they refused to surrender, so dropping the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were necessary to stop them. We never learned about how the people were affected. We never learned about the long-lasting effects of the nuclear bomb on the people and their descendants. We never heard the stories from the survivors. We never heard about how Hiroshima and Nagasaki rebuilt themselves. We never learned about the Japanese during World War II as people.

We started our day visiting the atomic dome, where the bomb exploded hundreds of meters above. We walked around the Peace Park until we made our way to the museum. The park contained an overwhelming sadness and agony that hung in the air while the rain gently drizzled on our umbrellas in the gray of the morning. My heart silently mourned.

The museum was what made my heart break until I could no longer contain the emotion and allowed it to escape through my eyes. It was the first time I had ever read excerpts from diaries of children, seen burnt bodies of victims, read about the thousands of families devastated by death and the inferno that the United States unleashed. I read about the junior high school students who were pulled out of school in order to work in the factories to help with the war effort, and how those same children died from the bombing.

I saw the tricycle of a toddler who was outside his home riding it when the bomb dropped. He loved his tricycle so much that his family decided to bury him with it. The family later donated the tricycle to the museum decades later. Seeing the tricycle and knowing that a tiny life was extinguished on it shook my core. I saw the burnt clothes of other children who were in Hiroshima when the bomb dropped. I read about family members rushing to Hiroshima in frantic search for their loved ones and how they never found them. To this day, not every victim could be identified. A daughter searched for days for her father; she found his bike and waited for him to come get his bike, but he never appeared. A mother was seen screaming her dead baby's name, begging him to open his eyes.

Dozens of stories were told there, each one a tragedy that ripped my heart into a new piece. The Japanese during World War II I read about in history books were no longer "the bad guys." For the first time, I saw the people of Hiroshima for what they were - people. They were children, mothers, fathers, uncles, aunts, sisters, brothers, sons, and daughters. It was at that moment that the sadness I felt overwhelmed me. I cried for the victims.

And in that moment, I wondered what the course of history would have been had we not dropped the atomic bomb. Would the Soviet Union have exerted its influence? Would the Japanese had surrendered anyway? Did we need to do that? Wasn't there another way? I didn't have the answers. I think the only being who knows those answers is God.

The messages of the survivors all had one clear message - nuclear disarmament. It was obvious why - the effects of nuclear warfare are devastating and endure for generations. It took decades for the city to rebuild itself, and that was with generous foreign aid from other countries. Most survivors don't want to talk about the bombing. For a long time, it was forbidden to mention the bombing.

I couldn't help but think of what the world would be like if we removed nations. A world without borders, without nationalism, and instead became one united people, the people of the globe called Earth. Each one of us is human, so why do we really need to separate ourselves? I dismissed the idea, knowing that there was too much greed and racism in the world for that idea to ever materialize. I then wondered if we could actually become a world without nuclear weapons. I dismissed this idea, too, because there are too many irresponsible leaders in the world such as Trump, Putin, and Kim Jong Un. They have no idea the level of devastation that nuclear weapons wield and if they ever did make such a nuclear attack, that attack could easily be reciprocated on their own people. I shuddered at the thought. I prayed that I would die before ever witnessing another Hiroshima.

President Barack Obama visited the Peace Park and the museum. He wrote a note that is on display at the museum. I pray that his note becomes reality in my lifetime:
"We have known the agony of war. Let us now find the courage, together, to spread peace, and pursue a world without nuclear weapons."