Tough Love

Years ago a woman shared with much chagrin
the day she drove her grandson somewhere, 
happy people riding along, having not a care in all the world,
when a man on bike approached and the child in back --sweet innocent child! -- said, "Run him over, Grandma!"
with such zeal it turned her blood to ice. She blamed
the games his mother (not her son, of course) allowed
the boy to play, implying that if Grandma ran the show,
he'd sprout wings, a halo! and I listened, thinking
this would never be the case with anyone I knew.

Today, and I should mention that today was wretched anyway,
I drove my grandson somewhere and a man on bike
approached, and when he said those same cold words
I'd heard those years ago, I grimaced, scolded, heard
the cherub in the back seat who had made my day so difficult
already feign a kind of incredulity that I would think he meant it.
"Just a joke!" he said, and I did not say what I thought,
but told him that I didn't hear a single person laughing.

But everything offensive has been taken for the difficulties
vaguely mentioned - tablet, laptop, xBox, even the receiver
for the television in both room and living room, so others of
us will be suffering as well, but I don't care. He's just a child.
There's time to teach him yet. He'll learn. Whether easily
or with much aggravation, we can't say, can't ascertain the
pain of all that will transpire before he bends and softens,
but he'll learn. That much is certain. He will learn. Easily,
with those who love him, or by walking down a harder path,
but he will learn. I'm sure of that. I hold my breath a little,
hoping that this time will be the last for drastic measures,
but today I'm dizzy from the lack of oxygen. He didn't win
but my heart's scarred. It doesn't feel like victory.



(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014