Chaos Theories

I was planning for my third scab to be the final in a trifecta referencing my favourite films from the 80’s.

But something wonderful happened on the weekend.

I became a father for the second time. A father to a son for the first time.

A son who arrived a little later than advertised (a week overdue), but earlier than expected (he was due to be induced on the following Monday).

I couldn’t write a Back To The Future themed scab after such a momentous event.

That would be frivolous.

Even though my son arriving coincides with Biden winning the US election and thus the end of the ‘worst timeline’ as predicted by the alternate 1985 in the first sequel.

I might come back to that at some point…

The fact that I changed the scab theme sort of becomes the theme:

Life isn’t as neat and tidy as the narratives we construct. 

New circumstances mean the changing of plans. Because though it’s often said humans are creatures of habit, we might not be here as a species if we were not able to adjust to new situations.

When the unexpected happens, we adapt.

When things don’t go exactly as predicted it forces us to think in more interesting ways.

In the last few days, I have found myself thinking more about the type of future my children are going to live in.

About how now more than ever it’s quicker and easier to get into a funk over The State Of Things. 

Twitter keyboard warriors, Election interfering bots, misinformation and fake news, data manipulation, big Pharma, big tech, global warming, air pollution, wildfires, Space Force, the 1%, open espionage, terrorism, mineral depletion, polarised politics, populism and the rise of the far right. Oh yeah, and that Covid thing that has changed modern life as we used to know it.

It’s a bit messy.

Some might say we’re staring into the abyss.

But one of the beautiful things about people is that they are great at learning.

And are adept at adaptation.

I say we take comfort in the chaos.

Let’s view it as Marc Lewis does and reframe chaos as the opportunity to find novel problems. 

Novel problems that if (when?) solved, could change the world for the better.

As a father to two young children, there’s no other way to look at it.