Excuses? Yes. I have them. He suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Running faster than a bullet. In the millisecond it took me to realize we were on a collision course -- I hit the brakes but I still hit the bunny.

He couldn't stop, I could tell by the look in his eye. I couldn't stop, I hope he could tell by the look in mine. I still hear the sound. I still see the remains.

How long will I continue to experience this moment? A moment on either side of the event, he may still be hopping around in the woods.

A moment. That's all it takes for everything to change. A pleasant evening up until that moment, once it happened, I cried all the way home.

How long will I beat myself up for it? How many times will I replay that moment in my mind? You might say, it's just a rabbit. Get over it. And you know what, you'd be exactly right. But this is not just about road kill.

Sometimes things just happen. We don't plan them, we don't ever consciously think about doing it and bam! It is done. We cannot un-do it. So the question is, how do you live with it?

How does the park ranger in Los Alamos live with the destruction and devastation of the out of control forest fire, when he is the one that lit the match? How does someone in a car accident, knowing they are at fault, live with the hurt done to others? How does a smoker diagnosed with lung cancer live with it? How do we un-do what we have done? This is the question that begs an answer.

In the book, Letters to a Young Poet, Rainer Maria Rilke writes: "Be patient with all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given to you because you would not be able to live them. Love the question now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer."

How can we un-do what we have done? Here's my answer: you cannot. It cannot be un-done. Yes, we did it. Yes, we are responsible for it.

Decide today, just how long you will allow what you did or what was done to you, to control you and allow sufficient time to grieve. It is okay to move on. It is essential to move on. Changed? Yes. Transformed? Definitely.

You cannot un-do it, but it should not be your un-doing either. You remain a beloved child of God, fully human, fully alive. Make amends as best you can. If there is a lesson to be learned, learn it well.

Sometimes life hits us with a question and we just want to run away from it. It's difficult, seemingly impossible to understand what is going on. Perhaps Rilke is right. When we learn to love the questions now, to face them head-on and be patient, then someday, somehow when we are ready, we will hit and run into the answers -- it's what life is all about.

© Becki Balok, May 2000.