I Know Why the Fates Were Old Women

The Fates, from ancient Greek mythology, were three old women who sat at their looms. They sewed constantly, weaving the tapestry that was your life. When they cut the thread at the end to tie it off...you were dead. They knew the future, and could tell if the choices you made would inevitably lead to your destruction. I think I know why they were old women.

I have realized, being a mother, that I am a fatalist, and if I don't change before I get old, I will be a Fate. This is because I know what's going to happen. When my son puts his milk too close to his elbow at the table, I know what's going to happen. When it's raining outside and everyone rushes in the door with their boots, I know what's going to happen. When kids start playing tag through the house, racing around corners, I know what's going to happen. It makes sense, and the consequences are obvious.

Usually I'm right, but a problem arises when I'm wrong. Sometimes the kid running down the hillside, arms flailing in the breeze, with both his shoes untied...doesn't fall down. Sometimes friends jumping off the top bunk, landing on the couch...doesn't get anybody hurt. While I am a fatalist, my husband is Providential--go ahead, let them try it, he insists, what's the worst that could happen? Getting injured is not necessarily the worst consequence in the world.

Job's wife was another fatalist, "Curse God and die!" She told her husband. God had hurt Job, so that made sense, it was definitely the reasonable thing to do. However, Job was not a fatalist, he was Providential. He refused to curse the God that brought the gifts in form of trials. In the end, he was blessed beyond all reason.

God most assuredly is not a fatalist. He foresaw all the trouble, destruction, and mess that we would make of the world--and He made it anyway. He relishes crooked lines, messes, and off-balanced toddlers running down the hill. He can draw straight, clean up, and even heal broken skin. Even Adam in Paradise may have tripped and skinned his knee, or knocked his milk over, and he blessed God when he did so.