Child

Do you ever meet someone and then have a whole glimpse of how they may have been as a child? We are so much more than the person we show others. There is a lifetime of passage we know nothing about. Someone introverted or extroverted may not of started that way. Our journeys build us, and we can rebuild that persona anytime. I guess that is why labelling bothers me so much. History does not have to repeat itself.

If you were free to be who you are and had a perfect childhood, do you grow up perfect? I don’t think so. There were trouble spots in my life and because of them, I strive to do better or more. When you lock people into that box and lower expectations for someone, do they strive to do better? Why would they? They are continually told who they are and may just opt to be just that. If you chose who you are today before maturity, you may become stuck there.

On a recent trip to the mall, I watched a parent berate their child’s behaviour, it was valid to have a consequence. It didn’t stop there. It became more than a correction, it became an attack on their character. It was a tirade, unrelenting bash of their apparent failure to ever do the right thing. Comparisons were thrown out, and anyone within earshot got a rundown of the history of bad decisions. People side eyed the parent. I watched the child, he was silent, he already had accepted that he would not be able to fix it. I watched for any flicker of hope in that child’s face. At one point he cast his head down and when it came back up, he started to walk toward his parent and then pulled that parent in for a hug. The look on his mom’s face and then his own, said it all. No matter how upsetting the original exchange was, I knew they would be okay. Coping skills were in place and although life would be hard, they would be okay. This child knew it wasn’t him. This child knew way more than he was given credit for. Sometimes love is all we need.