Rat

Leaving a sinking ship.

Every day, I pray that these bastards will be imprisoned for their crimes against humanity.

34 Months

(artwork courtesy of The Flaming Lips)

The year of the terrific twos is almost over and I have to say that it's been pretty terrific. Lucas is a happy kid. He smiles all the time. He dances and jumps and shouts to me when I come home from work. When I leave to run an errand he tells me, "Please daddy, don't go." He loves to go to the beach or the park or just read in his room. His favorite book is "Green Eggs and Ham" by Dr. Seuss, he almost has it completely memorized. He's learning so fast and having actual conversations with us and blowing our minds every day.

Xtina was talking to her brother about him the other night on the phone and she was describing how our lives completely revolve around him. Even when he's not around we're telling each other stories about what he did or said that day while we were gone. He has become the main focus in our lives and it's actually a very special feeling to care about a child in such a deep manner. It gives you a new perspective on what is truly important.

Although it seems like it's been absolutely fabulous, as many who have children can attest, it's not always a walk in the park. One of the dilemmas with the huge responsibility of parenthood that comes upon you are the moments when you realize that you cannot protect them from everything in the world. As they grow older that only becomes more and more true.

This past month shall also be called the time of the terrible toes. For most of Lucas' life so far he's only had a few minor injuries, nothing that a caring kiss can solve, but the one situation that has plagued our beautiful child is his damn toes. His first trip to the emergency room was because of a smashed toe from a large piece of flagstone, which we have quite an abundance of lying around the backyard. The second freaky "accident" he had happened this past month. The reason I put quotations around the word accident is due to the nature of the event.

We have no idea what happened but all we know is that Lucas somehow got burned on his toe. We were running some errands and about halfway through our tour he tells me that his foot needs a kiss. I look at his foot and everything looks fine, so I go ahead and kiss him. About an hour later, as we're walking along the harbor both Xtina and I notice that Lucas is limping so we investigated. What we found was absolutely terrifying. He had a blister that practically wrapped entirely around one of his toes. It was unidentifiable, weird and very upsetting. So we went and took care of it immediately, cleaned it and wrapped it up. The next day the skin was practically falling off and the skin beneath the blister was bright red. So we did some research and basically narrowed it down to a chemical burn as the most probable result. We mended it as best we could and watched it for a few days until it seemed like it wasn't going to fall off. Only then did we begin to breathe a bit easier.

But the rage...the animosity that climbed into my heart. I never imagined that I would ever feel this way about anything. I hate the fact that the general conscious of humanity allows the poisoning of the future to occur without an objection. For the first time in my life I was horrified at what we are doing to the world. We are killing the future and we don't care. It's sick! Our politicians and parents and preachers and teachers all proclaim to care about their own children but if my son can get a chemical burn simply by walking around the streets then this civilization that we've developed is failing. When I think about it, I feel the disgust wanting to vomit all over this keyboard. We have to care more about our children. We are failing them.

It's strange to feel this way. Since I became a teenager and was forced to suddenly become aware of my impact on the world, I have lived in a tenuous apathetic existence hoping that one day I would eventually snap out of it and see the light. That never really happened, our lives aren't like the movies after all, but I did become aware that I am generally responsible for what happens to me. And, as long as that meant that I was simply destroying myself by participating in the poisoning of the future then I didn't really have a problem with it. It was only a slow form of suicide after all, right. We can aid in our own demise with no qualms whatsoever (and if we take a few others along with us then what the hell) but once I felt the burden of protecting my own child then all of our hatred toward the world became unacceptable.

All that this actually means is that I have to change how I act and what I teach my child. The only reason that I felt that way was because others before me didn't help me understand the importance of my own life, didn't show me how beautiful I really am, didn't teach me to believe in myself. It's tragic because countless people had to suffer to get where we are today and now that I am looking around, it seems that all we are trying to do is make it worse.

It is truly beautiful that I am alive right now at this moment. There are things that I can do to make a better world for Lucas. Why not try and do them? The world is fucked up enough without all the rest of us causing more pain by our deliberately ignorant actions.

Hey, Lucas? Do you realize that you have the most beautiful face?