So here I am. Doing something I rarely do…enjoying a cold one. It’s not that I detest drinking. I sure have done enough of it though to last a lifetime lol It’s just hard to get everything I need to get done in a day done if I am drunk or buzzed or whatever it is we are calling it these days. Over the years I have found that I have rarely any self control. One is never enough. Never ever enough. Partly too because I love to read there is no sense in reading something you can’t remember so I just choose to stay away. Today though was a little bit different. Today was our Christmas themed family shoot and like every good housewife from the 50’s you need the obligatory drink in front of the newly decorated tree. Once you fill a glass though you can’t just pour it down the drain so down the hatch it must go.

The thing with drinking is it lowers your inhibitions. It makes you say and think things you normally wouldn’t. At least that is what I remember but in the spirit of the holidays I decided to indulge and let my mind wander into areas I am not sure if my mind is prepared for. For example…I was already skeptical about our Education system and the direction that it has taken. School was a saviour for me (at times I was a teen so of course there were days when I was bugged. But bugged by other kids). Now I can see just how much of a nightmare it has become for some…maybe all.  Imagine a World where your pride and joy is getting called names at school. What would you tell them? Go to a teacher right? What if it was the teacher calling them stupid and dumb? What if you went to the Principal as their parent and get called basically the same names. Told that if your daughter/son didn’t like it to ship out.  Zero accountability these days for nothing. Destroy our youth by showing them that bullying is alright at any age. That a figure that you are supposed to feel safety in has now become your tormentor. Now imagine a grown adult ridiculing a child. I ask you now what business does a teacher have in our school system if they are so broken themself that they reduce themself to this behaviour. I wish I could say this was an anomaly but it’s not.  Even when I chose to confide in a teacher way back in the 90’s I was told that what I wore was a direct result of what happened to me. I was assaulted. Like so many of our youth these days. If an adult you trust tells you you deserved it well you believe them.

What a distorted sense of reality we all have when this is commonplace. We have grown men getting off on our babies. We entrust these saviours with our soul and this is what they do. They spit in our faces and hide behind our one weakness. The fear of life after death and that salvation can be found in our heavenly father. These men pray on our weak and now because we allow them to get away with it it spills out into everything we do. They used to say our children or our most important resource. What a joke that is. We don’t even trust our innocent to come to us with the truth. We teach them from a young age what it means to lie, cheat and steal. Our children live in our own image and if they come to us telling us the truth it only must be a lie if we are guilty of the same. A child learns from us. They become us. It is interwoven into every fiber of their being. They are our mini me’s and are only capable of bringing into life what they have seen us do themselves.  Right? An innocent child who hasn’t been exposed to all the wrongdoing and misfortunes of the World wouldn’t be able to comprehend such vulgar lies. An innocent child will tell you, “This is what happened, this is how I feel. Please help me so I don’t have to feel this way again.” When we don’t value what they are saying they learn that their voice will never be heard. That even when the unthinkable happens it happens apon deaf ears so don’t bother trying.

How many tragedies in our lives could have been avoided if children’s feelings were honoured. We are spiritual beings capable of great things. We have the power within all of us to feel when something isn’t right. Over time that feeling dulls as we learn to numb ourselves with outside means. It is far easier to ignore the reality that is right in front of us when we cloud our own judgement not to think. That is why I used to drink in the first place. I wanted to numb those voices that were constantly telling me I was never going to be enough. Our mind, our ego, our own poison is what will bring us to our knees. It isn’t until you can recognize it in somebody else that you can understand the vastness of what is at stake. We are letting the evil win over and over again. We need to value those that have the courage to speak up. We need to honour those that tried and were ignored and paid the ultimate price.  The whole point of what I do what I do is to save a life just like mine. A life that no matter how hard they tried it was never going to be enough for those that she loved the most. A life that had to feel a great loss before finally believing in herself.  I spent 40 years trying to understand what nobody before me has succeeded at. I am talking about the meaning of life…more importantly my life.

The crazy thing is life has no meaning and life has all meaning depending if your glass is half empty or half full. That all that matters is the company you keep and the friends you make along the way.  We all have acquaintances but it is harder to acquire true life long friends. Maybe life doesn’t warrant the longevity of such a union. Life becomes harder when you love with a full heart. The loss of those closest to you becomes unbearable. Maybe that was what I was most afraid of. The fear of those leaving me before I do. Maybe I am stronger than that though. Maybe I can bare the weight and the burden of loving and losing. What a better way to say I love you to those that passed then to live a life well lived in their honour. Maybe by living in ones true own image the chains will slowly fade away. Maybe if enough of us started seeing the World in the way that I do it will become a much softer space. I am constantly ridiculed for having too much of an open heart. I also firmly believed that I would rather give somebody the benefit of the doubt then turning them away.  I also believe though that one chance is enough to proove yourself to me.  The fear of getting bit twice always lives within me. But no matter how hard I try I still always need to be humble and remember just how far I have gone. In fact maybe tht is what I need…a constant reminder to live humbly and to always give back. That does sound more like me and something that is worthy of a bevvy. I most certainly will drink to that. The World needs to be a much softer place and I am committed to trying to do just that.