Family matters

One morning, after attending church, my wife, daughter and I paid a visit to a distant relative, who had spent almost two months in the hospital. We had heard through the grapevine that this person was dying from stomach-cancer.

The name of the disease alone will undoubtedly arouse images of a terrible disease. When we entered her room, indeed, we had a glance the plight of a person suffering from terminal illness. Her body was so wracked with suffering that we could hardly recognize her; a far cry from the vivacious girl we used to know some thirty years ago. Her eyes flickered in recognition at the sight of us, after which they retained a look of hopelessness and despair.

I started a conversation with the patient's husband, a physician, whom I hadn't seen for a very long time. He seemed to be a good conversationalist and I was impressed by his philosophical knowledge.

However, a few days later my wife told me that the husband has a mistress and had even bought a house for her. When I heard this story, I could not help but shake my head in disbelief at such a terrible deed. At the time, I asked myself how such an intelligent man could do such cruel thing to his wife.

It seems to me that the most difficult thing for a man is to control himself. In this case, for example, the man has thrown away all feelings of decency, his reputation and his compassion, just for the sake of getting a few moments of sexual pleasure.

A. DJUANA

Jakarta