Entry 100

I'm surprised that this will be the one hundredth entry in this space, so I thought I had better make this one especially meaningful.

In light of what recently happened through this past week, I've been struggling hard trying to figure out and focus on what good is left in this world. I need not add extra commentary about the recent events in Connecticut. The news services are over-broadcasting the story and surrounding issues of it enough as it is, and consequently overwhelming us with more fear and sorrow during a season when we are trying to seek comfort and joy.

Above is a picture of a little baby boy; he's not just any baby boy. Currently, he is one that I have the greatest responsibility of caring for, and the one I am trying hardest to not get any further estranged from. I keep this picture of him with the rest of my family photos on a table in my bedroom, so he is amongst one of the first things I see when I wake up, and one of the last things I see when I go to sleep: as a reminder to stay strong enough to keep on nurturing him.

There were/are a lot of challenges in raising this particular human being for his particular needs, but I generally summarize them all to the following matters:

1. Not doing anything stupid that would lead to injury, or the death of this human being.
2. Not letting him waste his time being too long exposed around senseless, shallow, spiteful, obnoxious, ignorant, arrogant, negative, deluded, destructive people.
3. Trying even harder to not allow him to become like the aforementioned types of people when confronted by such beings.
4. Doing whatever gives him a sense of wonder and value about life, and making allowances to educate him, and allow him to grow for the better.
5. Making sure he wakes up each day with some sense of purpose, or at the very least a productive/mind-stimulating interest.
6. Helping him find valuable moments to laugh, be creative, relax, explore, and play.
7. Making sure he intends and acts in such ways that (ultimately) do more good than harm for himself and others.
8. Keeping him aware that it is ultimately he himself who is responsible for his own happiness and welfare.*
9. Reminding him to be thankful and appreciative when he finds people nice enough to provide acts of kindness for him and the sake of his happiness and welfare.

Those are the basic elements that I would say are essential to keep an individual within the realm of  sanity and mindful of personal responsibility. I'm not saying that I'm terrifically successful, in word or deed, at providing/teaching any one of those things to this fellow. I'm especially bad at teaching him points 2, 3, 6, and 8. However, I haven't found a day yet when all these things were absent from the board.

I suppose most of you who know me are wondering now who that child is, so let me introduce him to you. His name is Brian. That is a photo of me taken when I was 10 weeks old. The point I'm trying to make here is that we all have at least one child, no matter who we are, in our life to take care of. The skill sets that I mentioned apply not only to looking after a newborn life; they apply to taking care of our own grown adult selves as well. It all comes down to the question(s), "How could you ever even dare to harm this (little) person?", or "How do I want to help make this little guy or girl grow up right?" Once we do that, and then realize that we all were once that small, weak, innocent, and vulnerable, we (perhaps) empathize more, become a lot more mindful to do more things to nurture ourselves and others better, and to protect ourselves and others from our own craziness and stupidity, and be less prone to developing into some sort of soulless monster. All homes should have at least one baby picture in them, and they should be meditated on frequently: especially if the baby in the picture is all grown up, living alone and independently, and responsible for (and having some unique stressors for) being one's own sole provider of one's household and livelihood.

Some of you may roll your eyes and laugh and scoff at what I just wrote, but I can't help but to wonder if rampage killers of the likes of Marc Lépine (the Dec 6th, 1989, Montreal École Polytechnique shooter), the teenage psychos who shot up Columbine High School in 1999, James Eagen Holmes (the 2012 Aurora Theatre shootings), Anders Behring Breivik (2011 Oslo bombings/Utøya Island shootings, Norway), and most recently, Adam Lanza (the Sandy Hill Elementary School shooter) could have done what they did had they looked at themselves as children in a photo a little more often and asked themselves those same questions.

*- I have more than enough examples for this child of how a woman/girlfriend/wife isn't a static solution, the pretentiousness involved with success/status/fame aren't solutions, and of how money can't buy your way out of some problems. You will be doomed if you are constantly and desperately relying on any or all of these things for your happiness and welfare.