There was news story this week about a high school student who was killed while riding a tiger. She was having her senior class picture taken with the big cat when the cat turned to look at her. She took the look as a hungry one and screamed, which startled the animal and, well, you can guess the rest. In Las Vegas we remember the longest running show on the “strip” coming to a sudden halt when one of the stars was dragged off the stage by a white tiger that had its teeth in his neck. Siegfried and Roy finally closed after thousands of shows where they played with the tigers. The news captures stories of us swimming in the ocean and getting bit by sharks. There are more and more stories of people playing with tigers and getting bit, playing with fire and getting burned, and jumping out of barns and getting broken bones.
Wait, what was that last one? My brothers and I would climb to higher and higher windows in our barn on the farm and dare each other to jump out of them. If the brother survived, then we would volunteer or dare each other to go higher. It was all fun and games until a bone got broken. Then it came to a very sudden stop.
Why do we play with tigers? Why do we go out on limbs, repeatedly, just to see if they will hold us? A scorpion and a fox met each other on a riverbank, both wanting to cross. The scorpion asked the fox to take him over the river. “I can’t” said the fox, “You will bite me as soon as we get going and I will drown in the water.” The scorpion promised he would not bite until the fox agreed. Halfway across the river the scorpion stung the fox. In his dying breath the fox asked why? The scorpion simply replied, “It’s in my nature.”
Each time we use drugs. Each time we drink too much. Each time we “go out” on our spouse. Each time … each time … each time. We play with our own tiger. It took only one time for the high school girl, it took thousands of times for Roy, and you may be in your hundreds by now too, but you WILL get bit. It’s one of the rules of nature.