I'm supposed to have answers. I wonder who will answer my questions? This week has been a major challenge for me. I feel beaten and broken down. I don't feel successful. I definitely don't feel pretty. I don't think I've felt that in about 200000000 years. I see so many things around me that I wish were different. I ask my students and my children all sorts of random things. I imagine that I am quite an enigma. I look back now at my childhood and adolescence and realize that I am the weird child they talk about in the child development classes.
This weekend friends of our family lost their sister, daughter, aunt and mother in a car accident. Car accidents...for as long as I can remember...are one of my biggest fears. It seems too terrible to bear. My heart breaks for them.
I see so many kids doing so many things that are hurtful. Babies having babies, kids lying and stealing, breaking into the school- particularly my room- just to be vandals, kids calling in bomb threats, using language EVERY DAY that would make my Navy veteran Daddy blush, drinking until they pass out or smoking until they can't speak then posting the pictures ON THE STUPID World WIDE Web, arguing with one another to the point of fighting over things that won't matter two weeks from now, kids who will "yes ma'am" you 'til the end of the world and pay no attention whatsoever to what you've told them. Not to mention a lunatic pulling a gun on the campus my daughter attends along with many of her high school friends.
Is the rest of my career going to be spent speaking to noone listening? I don't know if I can handle that. I try really, really hard to make a difference. I love these kids, I really do. They can't understand, because of their youth, I know that...well, intellectually I know that. Emotionally, my heart breaks. Every day. A million little pieces.
I'm told not to trust them. They can't be trusted. Well, I trust them. I will trust them until they give me a reason not to. Once that trust is broken...not likely to get it back. Am I naive? Probably. Am I going to regret it...maybe. Do I believe what the Bible says about 70 times 7? EVERY DAY EVERY SINGLE WORD.
So then, that's the answer to my questions. I have to hold on to the hope that Jesus gives me. I have to believe he knows what's around every corner, behind every wall, and in every day. I have to believe the old adage that "If I can reach just one child..." I can only hope. There ya go...ramblings of an old, fat, menopausal lady. Be afraid...be very afraid.
