I Do It Myself

I just got an iPad. The jury is still out on whether it could ever fully replace a laptop, but it certainly comes in handy and I can take it with me wherever I go. Kind of like a puppy, but it doesn't need a leash.

So far my favorite thing about my iPad is the solitaire app. I'm fairly addicted. In fact, my husband, son, and I all vie for our turn to have at the cards and see what we can do.

This particular solitaire app even has the "hint" option. That is great if you get stuck, which I often do. Sometimes the hint just makes no sense at all. Sometimes it tells me "no useful moves detected." But every so often, especially when I am distracted or tired, the hint shows me the obvious. Just a gentle nudge about moving the red five onto the black six. Often after this hint I can go on to win the round. But I don't like it. I don't feel like I've won. Because I needed the hint, it means I didn't do it myself.

Funny, that. How you can learn something about life from a game of solitaire. I go along and get stuck but I want to figure it out myself. I bang my head against the wall. I NEED someone to give me a hint and point out the obvious. But then I feel bad for being so needy, for not figuring it out on my own. But we were never meant to live life alone.

The first time God said it wasn't good was when he saw Adam. Alone. And Adam NEEDED someone else.

Our need for one another seems to be written into the created order of things:

Two are better than one,
because they have a good return for their work:
If one falls down,
his friend can help him up.
But pity the man who falls
and has no one to help him up!
— Ecclesiastes 4:9-10

When my oldest child was three, my husband and I reached out to hold her hands as we crossed a busy Wal-Mart Parking Lot From Hell. She grabbed her one hand with her other and exclaimed in defiance, "I hold mine own hand!" We laughed hysterically at the time, giggling at the naivete of it all. This blonde-haired, blue-eyed pixie of a girl assumed she could navigate the world, or at least her corner of it, all on her own.

I'm forty-eight and should know better. I should know that I was never created to do it alone and that sometimes I need a hand to hold. Sometimes I need someone to pick me up. And sometimes I just need someone to point out the obvious. And that's OK. I don't have to do it myself after all.

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