Last evening, three teenagers from our area were involved in a car accident just a few miles from my home. One was ejected from the car and killed, one was life-flighted to a Pittsburgh hospital with severe injuries and the other had minor injuries, but refused treatment. I didn't know any of the three boys or their families.
But my heart still wept when I heard the news. Not only because a young life was senselessly snuffed out. Not only because a mother has to bury her son. Not only because this boy's young friends will have to see someone their age in a casket, and realize, maybe for the first time, that life is fleeting and death is final.
My heart wept because I have a child.
A child that, though only 2 and a half now, will grow. And at some point in time, he'll tell me he's a man, when he's really just a boy in a man's body.
He will grow, and he will continue to test his boundaries. He'll see how far, how fast, how much of the world he can conquer.
He will remember what his parents taught him. Responsibility. Kindness. Common sense. Safety. Self-respect.
But friends. Friends that push at weak points. Friends that can fuzz the common sense. Friends that make you forget to be kind, forget to be safe, forget to respect yourself. But boy, those friends can be alot of fun.
And then they get in a car. Or they find themselves in a bad situation. And they get silly. And their testosterone starts. Faster. Faster. Don't slow. Don't stop. And then the lights go dark. Phone calls are made. People cry.
My boy, my sweet baby boy, will one day be old enough to drive. To go to college. To make his own decisions. And then he is truly free. No matter how much I scream, yell, threaten, cajole, praise, or bribe: at some point I have to sit back and hope that everything I have taught that child will be remembered and heeded.
My heart weeps because I know that not everything I taught will be remembered or heeded. And I hope and I pray that my son's decisions will not be life altering or life ending. I hope and I pray that J's 'bad' choices will be road bumps, not roadblocks. But, in the end, children must make their own decisions. Sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. And that is life.
And my heart weeps because I have no control over it.
