Theres a police lady who has been very helpful when I was dealing with Kristys stray way prior to going to Mountain Home Youth Ranch in the mountains of Colorado....(I had so much hope...I mean Dr. Phil even recommended it...sigh...Lao Tzu would say I set myself up for disappointment by being expectant...let things be....sigh again...) Anyway, I told her about a terrible tragedy with a classmate when I was in the 5th grade...this boy made my life a living hell....he was very cruel to me and at the time I was horrendously cross-eyed and he reminded me and the whole class about it daily...teacher didnt do much...she liked him...he was a great artist...and his father would come in and help kids do tumbling and stuff on Saturday as I remember...anyway, his dad was a military man and had been a child prodigy musically...he was in the military band.e summer of what I am remembering as 1958 he took his son...my protagonist who my mom wanted to strangle when Id come home crying and I became invisible and probably put on 15 pounds over that year...he took him and his sister to San Francisco to see a movie on a visit and on the way back stopped off on a farm road and shot both of them and then took his own life. The boy...named John...died...he was in the back seat asleep...his sister...by Gods good grace, was still alive when the farm family came home at 1:30 a.m. and saw their gate blocked by the parked car...they had been at the auto movies.....THANK YOU JESUS...the girl...then 13...was on the floor of the car up front...shed been laying down on the seat with her head resting on her dads lap...she survived the coma.....in the suicide note, which he had typed up premeditating the whole thing...he said the kids were best taken with him and noted that hed found a copy of Peyton Place under his sons bedroom pillow...that was a scandalous type book back in the day....I found an old yellowed copy of the book from the 50s at a thrift store and dropped it by for this police lady, who was curious about it after I shared the story...I dont ever remember grieving about the death of anyone like I did this boy...I sobbed for a week...I hoped hed gone to heaven....we werent the same faith and I had bought into the dogma thing then....today I know my Jesus would embrace him...he was taken way way too soon.....there was stuff.....other stuff that came out....the girl ended up getting a degree and became an advocate for child abuse.....she buys tons of stuffed animals in thrift stores that are like new and takes them to places that give them out to neglected children....she is a CASA volunteer....Reflecting back on this boy....he was mean and nasty...why he picked on me I dont know.....not even now...except I was different...maybe it was just because he could...maybe he could smell scapegoat and victim...maybe I wore that mask...all I know is if I knew then what I know now I might have said told myself what he thought of me was none of my business, and when he crossed his eyes and made a face at me and said something nasty, Id probably laugh at him and go about my business. When opportunity arose, during art, I would compliment him on his drawing (which I think I actually did...he was good) but I would also ask him to show me how I might improve my own....If I knew he would die that summer on a back road in a back seat in the safety of his fathers car returning from a wonderful time in San Francisco from a bullet point blank in the brain...I would have gotten out of self and been very very kind......but I was a child...just 11...and, at that age, due to the circumstances...my soul was chained to his........for a season...and even today I feel the grove marks of losing him....this is a cautionary tale born of truth......be careful.....so today....55 years later...when I saw the book in the store I didnt see just a yellowed paperback, I saw a painful yet powerful chapter of my life and I took the book to the kind police lady...like I said...I had told the story to who had wondered about a book so significant it was mentioned in a note concerning such a tragic act. I learned many important things from this experience and I hope whoever reads this will, somehow, make an effort to do the same. It takes all kinds of people to make a world....we are either the teacher or the student.
Posted on: Fri, 15 Nov 2013 03:24:02 +0000
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