Our babies are watching
And some of our babies are lost.
And this lost ass world is eating our lost ass babies, as our other babies watch.
Let me take a few steps back, so you can follow my thought process on how I got here.
I remember, many years ago, telling my mom I would have NEVER been a slave.
I think my exact words were, “I had to be Harriet Tubman or something in a past life because I would not have been standing in some white man’s field picking cotton for free. Psht!”
She quickly corrected me and told me that while she admired the fight in me, I most likely I would have … because her job as a parent is to teach me how to SURVIVE …
and survival for the enslaved …
then meant doing as you were told.
And that stopped my self-righteousness in its track.
Because as a parent, it’s real AF.
And now here we are … with me having children of my own, trying to teach them how to survive. But I’ve come to a cross roads because what it means to survive is changing.
We now live in a world where you can be shot at at public events; where children are being ripped from their parents arms because of man-made borders; where my kids have to practice running and hiding at school in case an intruder comes inside to harm them.
It’s sickening, maddening even.
I had my son tell me the other day that he would protect us when we go places. And while my heart smiled at the sentiment, it broke because at 8 years old, his only concern should be video games, homework, and being an artist when he grows up – or at least that’s what he wants to be this week.
And if that’s not enough, there are worlds within this larger cluster of confusion.
The world I come from is one where you raise your children to be tough, not just mentally, but physically.
But as I try to teach my children how to survive, it becomes more and more apparent to me that all of this toughness, this callousness, this, “let’s tuck our feelings in because feelings are a sign of weakness and the weak are preyed upon” in my world, is turning us into shells of what we could have been.
Survival, right?
In some weird way, the things we learned to do to survive are killing us.
So I battle all of the time with the lessons I should teach my children. In my mind, I know the world is filled with kind people, people who despite the color of their skin and social economic conditions are good people.
But the reality is that our lessons in survival vary depending on the hands we’re dealt in life and survival to one person could be destructive to another.
So as I try to teach them compassion and be compassionate because I know they’re watching, they’re going to have to go out into this world. And it’s not going to give them the same energy because for many people, to survive is to LACK compassion.
And it’s all about survival, right?
I want them to grow into happy, healthy, productive (by THEIR definition) adults, but how do I do that if the world we live in doesn’t display the same.
It would be foolish of me think that because I do the work needed in my home (discussion, allowing them to express themselves, showing tolerance, compassion), that that’s going to serve them well when they leave my house.
Because I can do all of the work I want.
They still have to go out into this world.
And if the rest of the world isn’t doing the work.
It’s going to eat my babies too.
See I can live in a bubble out of fear of other people’s crazy – which I do unapologetically.
But I can’t deny them the opportunity to live their lives; to have experiences.
I don’t know, guys, these are just my thoughts for the week and while they may not be as cohesive as I’d like, I wanted to share them anyway in hopes that it may spark all of you to think about what we can do, how we can change things, how we can change the way we teach our babies to survive … and keep the dialogue going …
Because like I said in my facebook post a few days ago …
it’s only a matter of time before something else happens, that snatches our attention away from what’s really happening now.
And we’ll be lost too, distracted by some rapper and a secret baby or some elected official doing what elected officials do.
In the meantime, I think I’m going to continue to teach my babies compassion.
Because I’m starting the think the quality of their life while they’re surviving is more important than just surviving.
Peace, blog fam.
Until next time,
Love and Light,
Erin
What did you say?
You miss me when I’m gone?
Well, you know you can keep up with my antics every other day of the week …
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Be the person you want them to become because yes love, they are watching. xxx