Life isn't fair when you're Shawn Parker.

It's tough enough being a crew chief for a high profile team like Dale Jarrett, with tens if not hundreds of thousands of fans critiquing your every move while driver and car owner are in your face should any adjustment you make on the car not work out perfectly.  Now your wife Tara is battling a heart increasingly betraying her.  You spend as much time with her as you can with such a demanding job, watching her balloon because of the treatments, watching her do everything she can to combat something out of her control.  You watch, and you pray, and you debate with yourself whether an air pressure or wedge adjustment would be best to correct that tight condition in the middle of Turn 2.  You see her get the heart transplant she needs to stay alive.  You see her get better, so much so you adopt a son, and one day you splurge for a limo to take her and her two sisters out for a night on the town.  You sit at home, wondering why they're late, and then you get the message that a drunk driver rear-ended the limo, rupturing the gas tank.  Your wife and her sisters are dead.  You are left alone with your child, left to find some method of dealing with your grief and turning away the guilt demons screaming it's your fault even though you know better.

No.  Life isn't fair when you're Shawn Parker.

~

Life isn't fair when you're Deborah Renshaw.

It's tough enough trying to make it as a woman in a man's sport, searching for respect and a respectable ride as a race car driver.  You hear the whispers how you've made it as far as you have on looks alone, the insinuations of how you've advance through the ranks because of your skill under the sheets as opposed to behind the wheel.  You feel the accusatory stares of those who blame you for what happened during practice for that ARCA race at Lowe's when Eric Martin spun out and hit the wall, then just when it looked like everything would be okay you barreled into his car and he died.  You see your opportunities taken away one by one, every door closed to every possible place where you can get a job doing what you love: race.  Now the last door closes, and you're viewed as nothing more than another driver who never should have been allowed to drive in the first place and certainly isn't welcome to drive for anyone today.

No.  Life isn't fair if you're Deborah Renshaw.

~

Life isn't fair if you're Shawn Parker and Deborah Renshaw, the crew chief now working well out of the spotlight in the Nationwide series and the race car driver not working at all.  Life isn't fair when a light comes into existence, refusing to be doused by fear or insecurity or any of the dozen's dozen reasons people come up with to talk themselves out of chancing the vulnerability commonly referred to as love.  Life isn't fair when you take the deepest of breaths before taking the most sacred of vows, the ones that say no matter how I've been slapped around in the past or will be slapped around in the future I'm willing to risk it for the sake of being with you for the rest of our days.  Life isn't fair when two create one, a new life brought into this tired world by a couple who individually have tasted unspeakably bitter fruit yet still have the faith to believe it's worth going on despite it all.

No, life isn't fair.

Sometimes it's beautiful.

Congratulations on the birth of your daughter, Shawn and Deborah.

The Baker Curb race team proudly announced the newest addition to its racing family. Crew Chief Shawn Parker and his wife Deborah Renshaw-Parker welcomed new daughter Julianne at 7:58 am on Tuesday, July 22 at the Bowling Green Medical Center. 

Julianne joins her brother Jagger, age four, on the racing sidelines of the NASCAR Nationwide Series circuit. 

Father Shawn is the crew chief on the No. 27 Kleenex Ford driven by Brad Coleman. Mother Deborah is a former ARCA and NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series driver.  The Baker Curb team is headquartered in Nashville.

The NASCAR Nationwide Series races on Saturday night at O'Reilly Raceway Park in Indianapolis. ESPN will carry the race beginning at 7:30 p.m. ET.