Bricks

Almost nothing was under my control.

In an instant, my first lesson in gravity was painfully delivered.

What the hell just hit me?

I looked up to the sky. A brick just landed on my head. I crouched and ducked for cover, waiting for the impending concrete monsoon that would soon crush me to death.

Is this what life is like? You do nothing wrong, and still you are punished? How can you believe in a higher power, when you can’t even leave the house without fearing for your life? An onslaught of existential questions began to overwhelm me. I’d never even kissed a girl yet, and I was going to die.

However, no more bricks would strike my head. This was not some war-torn failed state. This was Long Island, New York. In the interest of journalistic integrity, I must disclose that I was the one who threw the brick in an upward fashion, not understanding it would eventually reverse its trajectory. At this juncture in life, my understanding of physics was rather pathetic. In my defense, I was four years old.

This story was first told to me by my father, while we were celebrating my college graduation. It was around this time that my parents first came to grips with the fact their son would never be a doctor. Though they endeavored to grow an intelligent young human, focusing on education, health, and nurturing from a young age, here I was: hitting myself with bricks. I’m sure at this moment, it felt as if almost nothing was under their control.

My parents are industrious, earnest people. I would even venture to say they are salt of the Earth, but I’m not sure what that phrase means. They immigrated from India to New York. They had some children. They moved to Connecticut. In this regard: absolutely nothing was under my control. And I’m not complaining about that. I’d been birthed into an extremely lucky scenario. Another roll of the dice could have landed me in aforementioned war-torn country where I’d exist amongst rubble, never having food security let alone stable WiFi. Instead, I weaseled my way into a situation where a very caring couple of Indian people consistently provided their children with food, books, love, and on very rare occasions, chewing gum. It was the promise of chewing gum that my mom used to lure me to the hospital, where she gave birth to my sister. Another brick of adversity brought into my life that I still face to this day.

We are often hit with bricks (metaphorical bricks of misfortune and tragedy, not physical bricks of concrete and mud — woah. I know.) and it’s not under our control. Other times, almost everything is under our control. For example, 100% of the times I’ve been hit on the head with a brick, it was under my control.

It’s not how many bricks you get hit with that matters. This measure is useless. (But if it’s more than 5, this is a cause for concern.) There is no point in trying to avoid it — after all, almost nothing is under your control. It’s more important to see what you can build with life’s constant hail of bricks. Maybe a house. A library. Maybe one really big, comically sized brick. Maybe you’ll build the ability to spin a meaningless thing you did when you were a four-year-old idiot into an enduring life lesson.