WHOSE FAULT?

Two children died. Two Children Died. TWO CHILDREN DIED!

I had not really met Juan Pablo. He was very sick when they brought him in and was not allowed visitors. I believe he was thirteen and from what I had heard, an old pacient to the place.

Esther was only six. My heart did not allow me to cry nor ask anything from anyone. They were too afraid for their own children, I thought…

I just stood there watching the empty room from behind the glass door and remembered her. She had been my student. I felt for her parents, I tried to contemplate.

I understood my life was easy.

So near midnight after coming home from the hospital I started making bread.

I mixed the dough and kneaded it well.

I waited for it to grow.

I made little buns and put them on the pan.

The oven was already hot waiting for the load.

I waited for them to bake. It was 3 AM.

How pretty and perfect they looked as I took them out –

my own little breads made for everyone to enjoy in the morning.

Yet upon trying one of them I learned that it had only baked on the outside,on the inside the dough was still uncooked.

Was it my fault? Was it the oven? Was it the recipe?

I went to sleep confused,

thinking of all the effort being in vain,

regretting to have ever started it.

Could it be that Esther´s parents would feel the same way, blaming the doctors, blaming themselves, blaming life´s injustice? We try to mix the right “ingredients” in the “dough” – which is our efforts in our children, we see them to grow, we expect them to be happy and make other people happy too, we paint their futures beforehand in good hope… and with that hope we bake them in the “oven”, which is nothing else but Life itself. And Life happens.

And that´s it…