Blind trust

When I was well over 21, coming home from almost 3 years in short-term missions, my Dad told me it was time to get my driver's license. I didn't want to at all, I saw no need for it, and I definitely did not have time working two jobs and engaged in choir, dance practice, teaching dance and prayer meeting 4 nights a week. But I never questioned him, and traveled by two different buses each way to Sandnes for over 30 driving lessons (not counting the mandatory), even failing exam once (well, that's another story!) until I got it.

Some years later - in 2005 - after I'd come home from 3 months in Hawaii, my Dad told me it was time to get an apartment. I had never thought about it before, why would I want an apartment when I wouldn't live in the same place anyways? I had never dreamed of a big house and owning something, and definitely not by myself. But I never questioned him. As a broke student on loan and scholarship, working only 5 hours a week in a clothing store I stumbled upon an apartment showing (visning), the first one I'd ever been to, and bought it right away. The bank told me I'd be fine, oh well, I didn't earn hardly anything and had years to finish school, but they reckoned I'd be ok (another story, remember this was the early 2000's, and banks were still throwing money after you).

And then, a couple of years later my Dad told me it was possible to get cheaper laser surgery for my bad eyesight abroad. "We'll pay half of it!" My Mom and him told me about someone else they knew that had done it, and I never questioned them - really - but traveled for a check-up in Sandefjord (another story!) and then traveled alone with a group to Czech Republic (Tsjekkia) and had a foreigner in a foreign country do a laser surgery on my eyes. I was scared, but I did it. Just like that.

Trust is a funny thing. If you trust someone, you can take the biggest risks, you can do the craziest things. Afterwards you might not really know what happened, you're just glad it all went fine. When I was a kid my only argument many times was "My Dad told me!" No other explanation needed, at least not for me. I gave all kinds of power and responsibility into the hands of a mere man, just because I trusted him.

I don't know what happened, if it was before or after he died, or if it has been a part of becoming older, or on the way to maturity, but I don't find it so easy to trust anymore. In a time where banks are being investigated and teachers are encouraged to document every phone call they make, where people are being replaced by computers and security and HMS are on the top chart and you're being stupid if you marry without signing a prenup (ektepakt som beskriver hvem som får hva ved mulig skilsmisse), I find it hard to really trust anyone, even myself. I don't feel fully comfortable unless I can really 'document' that I am right. 

What if I never would have gotten the driver's license, not been able to pay the mortgage (huslån) and the surgery had made me blind, would I then have trusted my Dad? And what made me trust him anyways? Was being a Dad simply enough, or was it because he had earned that trust over years, proving ('documenting') that he was trustworthy?

Though it may be a part of maturing I'm afraid what might happen if I am unable to trust anymore, whether it be leaders, politicians, health care system, schools, my pastor or my friends and family. What kind of society would we have without it, I wonder. What kind of friendship?