Aarcflick

 When I was about seven or eight years old, I did something strange during a school exam. My mother prepared me for the essay section by having me practice the topics that, with almost total certainty, would appear on the test. And so it happened: of the four topics to choose from, three were the usual ones—the very ones I had practiced over a million times. But then, I decided to write about the unusual topic instead.  After the exam, my mother was truly furious when I told her what I had done. My father, on the other hand, asked me why I had done such a thing. My answer was: "I simply felt like doing it." My father then said that was fine. He added, moreover, that no matter what I chose to do in life, he would support me unconditionally. And if things went wrong, he promised he would take care of fixing them. About two years later, my father passed away due to kidney failure. Sadly, he was unable to keep his promise. My life would have been infinitely easier had he still be...