Fairness

I've been singing a song of sunburn. Probably because I managed to get a killer sunburn on my neck last Saturday, only to follow it up with a killer sunburn on my shoulders and legs this Saturday.

The first sunburn was the result of pure folly: when my roomate and friends said we'd only stay at the arts festival an hour or two, I took them at their word. I thought that surely, surely I'd not get terribly sunburned in the course of an hour or two.

Three hours later, we left the festival and I looked at my arms with slight dismay. I was, indeed, sunburned. When a fair-skinned person stays in the sun for 3 hours, she burns. Despite her hubris.

Yesterday, my roommate and I decided to relax by visiting the waterpark at Cherry Hill. They have a lazy river that can be wonderfully relaxing. (I say "can be," because at one point there were roughly twenty little munchkins swimming around the lazy river, playing tag and splashing any and all in their path. And pretty much everyone else was in their path.)

We applied suncreen before we left. And she came home with a slightly sunburned face, whereas I came home with red shoulders. A slightly red back. And upper legs that look like they're on fire. Which they sort of are, I guess.

I whined about the unfairness--two roommates, same amounts of sunscreen, and I got fried? And she didn't? And then I heard my dad's voice in my head, asking who told me life was fair.

Nobody, obviously. It's just a presumption I've had. But as we sat in Sunday School today talking about all of the different (metaphorical) weapons we need to bury so we don't fight against God, a girl made a comment about how all of our "weapons" are obviously different things. That's part of what makes us individuals. Part of the reason our lives, our experiences are tailor-made.

It's important that we bury our weapons: not our siblings', not our friends'. We don't share the same weaknesses, just as we don't share the same strengths.

And when I stopped to think about that, I stopped to think about how ridiculous it is to decide our lives are not fair because we are comparing ourselves with others.

Our lives are, in fact, as fair as Heavenly Father makes them for us. And given all the aids and resources He has provided us, I would say that's pretty darn fair. In fact, I'd say that our lives are more than fair, because they are ours.

And we don't really gain much in comparison.