Candle Flame. Don't Touch.

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Kids! Don’t touch this. You turn your back and they touch the candle or two-bar heater. Wailing in the next room! You rush to scene and the little explorer is clutching her finger. You blow it to make it better and take her to the medicine chest, for the appropriate ointment. In rural areas, grandmothers have herbs for it.

Blowing the finger works in the little mind. Tears stop and she rests her head on the mother’s chest. You think it’s not scientific? Stop it! Don’t give science a bad name. Must everything be pulled apart, stripped bare like corn? What is important is kids believe it works. If the father asks about the incident. The little genie will report that she is feeling better because her mother blew the pain away.

The wound will disappear in no time and she will never touch the candle or heater again. Adults are not so clever. We relish things that give us pain. We know the consequences but do them over and over again. Just one more time, we say. There’s an online ad about stopping smoking, but there must be smokers that say : “One more puff, and I’ll stop.” We try and cheat doctors because they don’t live with us. It’s cheating ourselves when we indulge in forbidden food because we think they cannot see us. They can. How? Artificial intelligence.

Nonqaba waka Msimang

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