Incurable 2

A good book hangs with you like walking through a sticky spider web. Something has stuck and despite the attempt to brush it away every action wraps it further around you. John Marsden's incurable has stuck.

Ellie is faced with a decision like no other. Gavin has fallen down a cliff and clings perilously to an earth mound. It won't hold him for long. He will eventually loose his grip or the earth will break away. Either eventuality will lead to the same outcome. As Ellie looks down she suddenly reaches a new understanding ...

'At some point I realised what was happening. All those stories on the news about drownings ... so often it seemed like one person would get into trouble, be carried out to sea by the rip, and one or two or even three others would jump in to save him, men usually: fathers and uncles and brothers, who could not swim and knew they could not swim, but in their hearts was another knowledge, that they could not stand and watch, they had to be with the person in the water and share whatever was coming to them.'

Quick Thoughts and Questions ...

• Is this a story of the incarnation?
• Does the response to the horror of the immediate outweigh the suffering of the loved ones that are left behind?
• Perhaps love is revealed as the saving grace?