Babies who are ill, opportunities for living...

On Tuesday baby Abby, my brothers daughter was rushed into open heart surgery to keep her alive, as on friday she had gone into active heart failure.

Hamish and I went to see her on Tuesday night and it was quite a shock; babies are so small and vulnerable, so weak and new. To see her in recovery with tubes and cords and monitors strapped to her tiny body was very difficult and even more so for her incredibly brave mother and father, Emma and Adrian.

It's time like these where we should reflect on family, it's meaning, the fragility of life and our purpose for living it. In spite of that I am just relieved all went well.

How should we live our lives? Should we vigilantly self interrogate and strive for constant improvement, or should we be contented and satisfied with the joy of life and it's simple meanings? Should we be the best that we can be or live the best that we can live? Should we point out perceived errors, injustice; should we fight perceived wrongs; the very arbitrariness of these concepts could mean they are truly unidentifiable anyway.

Why is there such a high suicide rate in western wealthy countries, but negligible rates in poor and developing countries? Are we complicating our lives so much, we have forgotten how to live simply, but truthfully, honestly and with love? Let's face it, there's very little love in the west.

iPod, iPhone, iPad, a culture of the 'I' that rejects love and reality and looks for it on a screen that talks to you but allows no recourse; except to turn it off! You can devote your life to it - but it will take nothing from you but overfill your cup.

To be born and to die, these are the truly simple realities if living a life - within these factors you can expand or contract all you want - life can be huge, it can be wild, it can be a constant flowing adventure, a fast paced river of noise and movement. Life can be silent, listening rather than making sounds, or quiet, simple and understated living to survive, deeper breathing, slower moving, softer eating; and anything in between.

But it cannot be what it is, it cannot be just born and death - so when a child dies, or is at risk of death we are pained so very much by possible opportunities missed. And opportunity is what the in-between is all about. So we have to make choices, choices to grab at opportunities and fly them to where they may go. I hope to teach my children, all of them nieces and nephews included about opportunities - I don't think we should allow opportunistic or opportunism to be such dirty words.