This isn't exactly what I thought I would be posting tonight, especially after such a great, yet tiring weekend with my family. But it needs to come out...
Friday night we had decided to go out to eat dinner. We are all sitting and enjoying our Mexican food, and I look up away from my plate and I look straight ahead. I am a people watcher. I watch.
I saw a Father, in his 60's . His gray and balding head was all I could see for a moment. Then there was the tapping, of the keys. A gesture that looked like someone running in place. I also noted him choking back tears.
To his side I note his wife, also 60-something, she is on her cell phone, smiling and talking.
Across the booth table I note 2 boys, one 8, the other 10. Clean boys, with great short haircuts. They are eating and talking, and smiling.
Next to the boys, I see a 30-something, although it was hard to tell. He had both ears pierced, some sort of large Mr. T like necklace. He must be about our age. He is gaunt, very gaunt. He is bouncing his legs, and grinding his jaw, missing some teeth. Grinding his teeth. He looked like he was tweaking on meth or some sort of amphetamines. I am guessing it was meth. (Between Dear Husbands years of working at the jail, and my time spent at the hospital, it looked like meth.)
So I look back at the graying Dad, and he is looking at me. Worried looking, sad looking embarassed looking.
I was very embarassed that this Man caught me assessing the family situation, but it is what I do. I was trying to figure out if Grandma and Grandpa have custody of the boys full time, or if the Mom, who was no where in sight let Grandma and Grandma have them for the evening. Perhaps they convinced "Dad" to come with. Maybe they met out, because "Dad" isn't allowed in the house any longer?
It was sad, and disturbed me to my core, to see so many lives disturbed by this drug, again.....and for it to be soooo obvious, that no one can pretend. There was NO pretending here...none. It was a train wreck.
The look on the 60 year old Dads face was an awful look of failure and guilt....the kind the does not happen to most of us. He looked like he had tried everything he knew how to prevent it, to stop it, to make his Son happy.
It had to have been one of the most terrible things I have witnessed.
For some reason I keep thinking of this family, and those precious boys.
It is all I can think about.
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2 comments:
It's very sad. My mom has a friend who has custody of her grandkids for the same reason. :(
So sad, but I know that look. I've seen it in my brother who is now raising his grandkids.
I am thankful every day that we had an option in place for those kids when things went sideways. Even though it has had some extreme challenges, it is worth it when I see these well-mannered, clean cut children grow up with sparkling eyes and clever minds.
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