When someone you love is hurting.

When someone you love is hurting there is no greater feeling of helplessness.  At first you stay silent, while feeling  powerless.   Your worry compels you to give  warnings, advise, sometimes even bail him/her out of the depths of  despair.   You begin to feel desperate.  You see your loved one tied to the railroad tracks, you are watching the train coming his way;  it’s coming, it seems you are the only one who sees the train coming closer and closer, you feel the danger, you cannot do anything except pray that the train engineer sees him and, if the engineer is paying attention he will stop the train.

So goes the story of a loved one.  You pray he sees the danger and stops what is hurting him.  My brother died in the back seat of a police car.  His drugs compelled him to call the police because he saw Gypsies taking his furniture.   The engineer was not paying attention;  his parent’s old fashion pride and secrecy and the policeman’s complacency ran over him (Chapter Three).

The engineer could be you, the parents or strangers.  We must  all pay attention when dealing with loved ones in pain.  Mental deficiencies are not a disciplinary problem.