XLIX

I call it Super Bore, from the early games when both teams played conservatively and the object was to win the game without making the most mistakes.  Brings on nostalgia after watching the absurd extreme where the reach for glory reveals holes in the sanity of a team, while driving for the bold forgets about simple easy victory one yard from the gold.  But that’s not what this post is about.

Usually Super Sunday means Sloppy Joes, three IPA craft beers and nodding off on the coach at home before the third quarter nods off.  Last night, the emotions stirred.  Loss, tragedy and maybe a touch of growing insanity did background dancing as I watched the Pats and Seas parry their way to trophy and gophy awards.  Don’t get me wrong, I generate no emotional responses to sports events before, during, or after these charades of courage and skill.  But with no Sloppy Joe, no napping on the friend’s sack but only craft beer to keep and kindle my mind, I drifted off to the pained trials of others in places other, they without even the comfort of good beer.

After this night, neither I nor my game day hosts would be a changed person.  No game should do that to a person, though it happens.  Those gatherings taking place elsewhere, one far and one very near, were approaching their zenith.  Zeniths of internal conflicts.  Conflicts stowed away for decades and ripe, over ripe with the approach of death, and pending reluctant consecration.  This old dog will sit this high drama out.  Popcorn please.  Yes, real butter.  Medium salt.  It should be a good one.

The young are tough.  Resilient.  Usually indestructible.  But they can be damaged.  Permanently damaged if the adult irresponsibility irreparably scars or shames them.  Neglect?  No problem.  Favoritism?  Builds character.  Bad example?  Who isn’t?  I could go on.  Two sins are cardinal.  Two wrongs can never be put right.  Abandonment.  Abuse.  Keep them fed, clothed and dry.  In other words – stay.  No matter what your addiction, trauma or excuse – keep your hateful hands off of your children.  These things can’t be undone.  You may forget and escape them but the kids never will do either.

Gathered around a hospital bed, far from the home they knew, a mature family awaits the finality of the one who still held responsibility for the offspring.  This bad one lived the life desired giving nothing to those created and now lies unresponsive…not the expected scenario but clearly there was no long term thinking going on.  Life will go on.  But without this one.  Good riddance.

Child abuse, worse than abandonment, seems to inhibit hatred, which is the only joy bestowed by the abandoning parent.  Abuse cannot be reconciled.  Can not be justified.  Can not be comprehended by the child no matter what the age when harmed or what the age when pondered upon.  The nights are always frightful.  Holidays are always a hook back into the horror of the tragedy.  Time is frozen at the age of the assault and emotions can never quite grow up and away from them.  The shame is misapplied, and the damage also.

Nothing like a cold bucket of misery thrown on you a Super Bore Sunday.  Hey, that’s why I’m here, to dampen the spirits of otherwise happy folk.  I feel for those I have spoken of who are gathered or separated in grief.  Time is not a cure in these cases.  Work and success is not a remedy, it is a temporary distraction.  There is a difference between damaged kids (we all are in some way) and broken kids – there’s one close by.