Rough week for us all...

OK, been really sick these last several days. I know it's the metformin, and I just gotta hang in there and deal with it. Bad night. This morning was a little better. Then turned on the radio for the news. Heard about Newtown, Conn. and the children. Cried. Lots. Erased and closed out my blog post for the day and went back to bed as I felt immediately physically wrecked. Turned the radio off. This was about 10 a.m. Then I tried getting up about 2 p.m. Still just weak, exhausted to the bone. Craig made me a sandwich and I ate it and went back to bed. Passed out almost immediately. I made sure my upper body was inclined enough I wouldn't have reflux. I normally NEVER lay down within an hour of eating, let alone immediately after. I was just in that bad of shape.Crawled back out about 6 p.m. Turned on the radio and heard about the knife/slashing attacks at the school in China.

Cried again.

The person who committed this horrible act at Sandy Hook Elementary School was mentally ill, same for the person in China. No one can commit heinous acts like this and not be. They were not in their right minds, they were/are insane. We will never be able to make sense of this because that is the definition of insanity, acts that don't make ANY SENSE. No logic or reason can be applied to understand the whys of a situation like this because there was no logic or reason involved. In no way does that mean they are excused from what they have done. There is no excuse, just a why and a lot of grief that will take years, if ever to be resolved.

I'm not going to talk anymore about mental illness and this situation, I'm going to talk about the supposed sane people and their reactions to this horrible tragedy. Some days I hate this old world. People are sick. People are cruel. People are well...people are people. You'd think they were raised better. I won't get started, I promise. I will say what I need to and not pontificate to the point of dead horse. I promise.

Bad things happen to little kids all the time, every day and it goes quietly, goes below the radar. Today it was just brought to the reality stream of the masses.

Sad reality: A lot of people think they're better than they actually are. Think they're above the law, they have their own realities. Not all of them go out and start shooting people. They act out in other ways though. People in general are messed up and many of them feel they are entitled to act any way they effing please. It's hard living with a bunch of people that think this, but we as a nation are. We might even be one of these people at one time or another. Here's the bottom line: It's a hard old life. And then it's not.

Read the definition of "empathy" again, and really take it to heart. Be kind. Do what you can. Be nice, but not a doormat. Be true to what you believe. You are the grown up, act accordingly. Raise your kids, enjoy them for the blessings they are but don't let them run you. It's a hard old life and you aren't going to be around forever, make sure your kids can survive without you, but will mourn you when you are gone. It's a hard old life. And then it's not.

It's already a hard life for many kids. Not everyone is lucky to have a good home, a family life. Some kids don't get anything but grief. Over the years I've dealt with everyday tragedies against children. You do what you can but many don't get the help they need. They fall through the cracks. For every kid who is lucky enough to have a "good" home there is one that is lucky to make it through the day. I'm not being melodramatic. I wish I was over-exaggerating. There is usually at least one in every classroom, at least one, if not more. Sometimes even the teachers never have a clue. Kids can be good at camouflage and blend in when their survival depends on it and many times it can. Get along. Keep under the radar. Survive. It's horrible to think of kids in situations like this, but it is a reality for many of them.

From the kid who doesn't have a room, a bed, sleeps wherever he can find the most protected place. Kids who get their only food at school. Kids who live for the hours they can escape to school for another day because home is hell but they don't know what hell is. Kids who are ignored. Neglected. Taunted, mentally and emotionally abused. Beaten. Children, little small packages of joy, treated like trash by the ones that brought them into this world. All of it is senseless to me.

A crime against any child seems an unfathomable act of evil. Incomprehensible.

Facebook is flooded with prayer chains, prayer memes, people trying to figure out WTF and others screaming this is because God isn't allowed in schools and others using it as a soapbox for gun control. It just tires me out. The majority of my work years was spent working with children in this age group and their families, dealing with the joys and little pains of the daily ins and outs of life in a classroom. These crimes today against such small children seem to pierce me to the bone. It haunts me. Children, little small packages of joy, lying scattered like broken dolls, lifeless and ended. ENDED!

It hurts to think of it, I can barely breathe from the pain of it and still I wonder why why why. I know it will never be comprehensible. It is every parent's and teacher's worst nightmare come to life.
I can't fathom the pain of the parents and loved ones dealing with this right now and my prayers are tenfold to all.