Kidhood

The kiddo had a pretty bad experience in school a few days ago. It was one of those things that I couldn't fix for her; all I could do was hug her tight, talk it through, and to her and tell her to soldier on. And I know that there will be many more instances where she will have to face a situation where she has to deal with it on her own. I will be a helpless bystander, able to offer sympathy and support and not much else. For a mother, who's natural instinct is to go into fiercely protective mummy bear mode if she's hurt, that's hard to accept.

Life can be very cruel to a child if they make the wrong choices or pick the wrong friends. But what do kids know about choices? From what I remember, we mostly blindly follow our peers or try to emulate those that stand out. My parents never interfered much when it came to school stuff. At the time I was grateful for it, but I wish now that I had had a better understanding of how the rest of your life can be shaped by one event, one decision. Those days we had no one to tell us these things. No one acknowleged feelings back then. Oh we were loved, we knew that with certainity, but it was in a practical, absolutely intangible way. If someone had told me back then even half the things I tell my kid now, I might have turned out to be a completely different person. I probably wouldn't have stumbled around for a good portion of my early years enveloped in self doubt and insecurity.

Mind you, in a way I'm glad things went the way they did - because everything is pretty spiffy in the now. 

Equilibrium

What’s that you say? It’s not easy?
Damn straight it isn’t
“I know it’s hard” they say
“I don’t know how you do it”
“I’d have gone crazy if I had to do all you do”
Well, you know what?
It IS hard
I do it because I HAVE to
And you know the funniest thing of all? I’m probably halfway there to crazy
I’m know I’m resilient, but then, so are most people
No matter what crap life throws at us, we take it, and we deal with it
Not because we want to
But because we have to
Because we’re responsible and there’s no one else standing behind you to lean against when you’re tired.
So what do you do when you Do get tired?
You make yourself forget that you are, and soldier on
Drag yourself out of bed even if you’re as sick as a dog
Because someone else’s life depends on you
You Do it
Because it needs to be done
And it goes on and on and on
Day in and day out
Till you don’t know Tuesday from your arse and the dates don’t matter
So don’t tell me you understand
Don’t tell me you know what it’s like
Because you don’t
So don’t talk
Instead
Hold me for a while
Let me feel like I still matter
That despite everything, I am a person too, and yes, I’m allowed to have a life
Yeah,
That’ll do it.