If I had three wishes, one of them would be to remove the violent impulse from the human make-up. I know that this might result in an instant and fatal overpopulation of the planet, but I hate the need to be suspicious and on guard.
I want to be able to leave my children in the car, and know that the adults who are around will be protective toward them, rather than a threat. The thought of predatory people makes me so sad, as well as scared.
I am fundamentally innocent, naive, indeed. I don't expect the worst of people, despite the amount of time I spend playing out horrible morbid fantasies in my head. I don't really believe that anyone would abduct my children, murder me, burgle my house, steal my car. Although I'm selfish in a lazy way, I am basically altruistic in my motivation. I would always stop to help a crying child, pick up a lost wallet, offer a lift in the rain.
I find it hard to follow the rules of not touching students in school - no compassionate hand on the shoulder if they're upset - or not being alone in a room with an individual student in order to protect myself from allegation s of harrassment.
I don't want to accept that the world is as bad as it really is. And I don't mean the child porn rings or child slavery that on far from our doorstep, I mean man's basic inhumanity to man that you see in the street everyday.
I'm trying to force myself to be less trusting, more aware, or something's going to get me one of these days.
I just hope it's that someone's going to steal my battered car when I've left it unlocked again rather than anything nastier.
*There was a good picture of a man with a little dog and a little girl in a park but it was too depressing. I love this photo - and it reminds me of the time Charlie Haughey came to Greystones and my mother hid in a shop, in fear that he'd try to kiss my little brother. And as he walked down the street, some old lady ran up and started beating him with her handbag and telling him to get out of Greystones, nobody wanted his kind there! Fabulous.
2 comments:
I tried to help a woman recently in Daisy and Tom, her toddler had run away and she was rushing down the shop looking for him/her/it, struggling cos she had a baby in a three wheel buggy, she was hysterical calling the toddler, so I said I'd mind the baby for her. now bear in mind I had my own 3 kids with me one of whom is still a baby in a buggy...I don't want any more kids, esp. not some neurotic womans! she acted like I was a witch in a gingerbread house...maybe she thought I'd stolen the toddler and concealed him/ her/ it in my bags.
Oh, for fuck's sake! I let my daughter play there when I went ot feed the baby in abby room - it took ages - 2 nappy changes too - and whne I came out, I had to walk al hte way up the shop and back to the books before I found herreading o nhte floor. Yes I was beginning to panic even though I've tried to train myself to check first, panic later (I had to dthis as I lost my wallet so often I'd anticipate it, and freak out, and it was always just at the bottom of my bag).
So Would I have handed the baby over to someone else while I looked? I suppose maybe not, if I was freaked out and guilty - look at all these people who think Kate McCann murdered her daughter, criticising her for leaving her twins home and ravelling around.
Daisy and Tom is a good place to lose a child! you know they're just engrossed in something.
I love the idea of you going around collecting exta children, with agingerbread shopping basket!
Post a Comment