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growed-up and haired-over

   in my life's work, i help children survive til adolescence, i help adolescents survive til adulthood, and i help parents survive both. it's all i do. i think i am too big a wimp to do any other work. Pastor Don says my tears don't make me a wimp. but with a few exceptions, i take folks who have fallen through the cracks and have trouble getting help. their problems, sometimes, are problems that threaten their very lives. justice is frequently NOT blind and quite bigoted. addictions attack and control the strongest of hearts. john wayne may have quit smoking, but not til it had him. the most gifted among us are the most likely to be run off into the ditch. gifted people are rarely taught to live within their gifts because they are outside the norm and teachers are rare if the parents even know to look for them. hearts that are created to respond and to heal are often taken prisoner by skilled manipulators who recognize them a mile away. healing-hearts actually become addicted to fixing their broken partners' lives. so there are many avenues of brokenness and i join them in that brokenness when i am needed.

   having loudly proclaimed my sadness for those who have predatory aspects to their innocent lives, may i puh-leez highlight one aspect of "victimhood" that i am sick to nausea of hearing about? it is being called by many deep words in today's world, but it simmers down to this: "stolen childhood." michael jackson uses it as an excuse to have giraffes and mary poppins in his yard and underage, sick boys in his sleepovers. this is his way of "making up" for the "lost childhood." because, don't you see, this is what all non-stolen childhood looks like. i wind up with the same stuff between my toes listening to michael jackson as i get walking barefoot through a cow pasture. there is a show on fox called something like "moment of being scum for $500,000." they ask this female snotwad if she blamed her dad for ruining her childhood. in front of God, her dad, a studio audience, America and any intergalactic species listening in, she says in her best victim voice, "yes." that moment is already on the internet and therefore will exist until the end of mankind. so what do you think, blondie? punished enough?

   what is confusing is the sense of entitlement. who says we all have the "right" to painless passage from infanthood to adulthood without passing through a few skinned knees and broken hearts? if you saw the souls of my closest friends, they would look like hockey goalies who played without masks. it is called character, something the stolen-childhood people don't have to worry about. they aren't responsible for being growed-up and haired-over cuz they had their widdle feewings hurted. or they were becoming millionaires through music. or they were becoming olympic gold medalists. i have many friends in the 12-step community. they have real earned "right" to complain about stolen childhoods. instead you hear them quote this promise from their Big Book: "no matter how far down the scale we have fallen, we will see how our experience can benefit others." (that's close to a quote. i gave my dang book to someone new to the program.) self-pity is not a symptom of stolen life. it is a choice, and a stupid one to boot. when you have a real problem, how will anyone know? they are used to you belly-aching.

   there is no scripted childhood to steal. sure, there are feelings to be hurt, but many of us tread the same way on our kids' toes now that we are doing the parenting. it would be so wonderful if we had perfect childhoods. but it takes very little thought to realize that those perfect lives would have to include pain to prepare us for any kind of real life. i will tell you who has a stolen childhood: the deceased baby being held to his Nigerian mother's shriveled, starving breast. the maimed Pakistani child whose parents felt he would bring in more pity money begging if he was physically broken. the children who live in lands where human ownership of humans is commonplace. there is but one positive use of our pain, beautiful broken ones. it is to make a bridge to help those who share our brokenness to survive. it is to offer understanding to those still trying to breathe without fear of themselves or their torments. in offering understanding, we understand. in offering healing, we heal. in offering love, we experience love. don't you see? the inside of the hose gets wet. we experience the love we give. could it be set up more beautifully?

Posted by AllThingsBuck on 2008-05-28 23:21:11 | Rating: