Shattered

Broken Promises

By David Kirby

"...I have seen them in the foyers of theaters,   

coming back late from the interval   

long after the others have taken their seats,   

and in deserted shopping malls late at night,   

peering at things they can never buy,   

and I have found them wandering   

in a wood where I too have wandered....."   

            One does not live very long in this world of broken things, stuff, self, sex, without realizing that you cannot change anything that has already happened.

            Only a blind person knows the amount of glass, the amount of liquid, from anything that has fallen and broken on the floor. Only a mother or grandmother knows the sorrow of a child or grandchild who has sinned/ failed.

            One of my dearest friends, a single mother, raised two sons. She worked night and day to send them through college. The youngest, a dentist, died early, leaving one grandson. The older son gave her another grandson. Both sons, both grandsons, were drug addicts.

           

            In other articles, I have talked about my business involving antiquarian books, and other items, which I sell online. A man from another state called me about an antique silver tea service, which I was attempting to sell. In the course of conversation, I told him that one of my best friends in school-- I believed-- practiced in his city. He was amazed and said that he had been one of his best friends, that they played in a band together. He said, "He is probably the most talented man I had ever known." You realize his problem, that he died recently. I asked about his wife and he said, " I will have her call you."

            In just a few minutes, the man's wife was on the phone. She told me of my friend, the doctor's, great success, his large practice, his two sons, who were both doctors, having attended medical school in North Carolina. She said, "Gambling captured him. It became more important than his business or his family. He was found dead in a hotel in Las Vegas."

            Most people subscribe to the local paper so they can keep up with the obituaries. It is the only time many names appear in newsprint, and we wonder what type of baggage many take to the grave.

            It is not just addictions which enslave so many. Shackles of alcohol, chemical dependency, which cause an individual to lose, not only his own self-respect, but the respect of his family and friends. So many lives, with so much promise, are shattered, ship-wrecked on the rocks of satanic deception.

            Then there are those whose lives are shattered by divorce, not just the two parties involved-- two who were so happy at the marriage altar. Often, each thinks that with freedom, they will be fulfilled. As one lawyer said to me, "Each woman for whom I obtain a divorce, thinks she will be a debutant. Each time I see her, she looks worse and worse." This is just the couple; think of the children. And then there are the grandparents, many times an attempt to shatter relationships.

            One doctor, a pediatrician, told me, "I can always diagnose, so easily, sicknesses of children in a family divorce. I tell the mother, 'Don't ever disparage the child's father.' Your child knows his genetics. You may not still love the father, but your child does."

            Perhaps the most shattered lives I have ever encountered are that of those that have left the prison system. As if it is not bad enough just to be tarnished from having been there, now have to pick up and start over-- to start over with nothing. Perhaps this is the reason that there is so little rehabilitation, that so many are reincarcerated.

            A former employee of mine, jailed on a minor drug charge, said, after his release, that his family and friends would have nothing to do with him. One of my cousins, an enlisted man in the Army, went to sleep during guard duty. He spent time in the stockade. On his discharge, he told me that his family and friends would have nothing to do with him. They would have never known of the matter, but he was honest enough to tell them-- the reason he could not get the military benefits of most veterans.

            In the past 23 years, 2.5 million people have died from prescription drugs-- many mistakes of doctors. Will we ever know how many people die in surgery from doctor's mistakes? Yet, in every town, a "pill hill" (an area of fine homes, where doctors live). How many lives have been shattered by incorrect prescriptions, wrong medications, a faux diagnosis. This doctor gets so sick of hearing people talk about a "second opinion." It is difficult enough to get a first opinion. Never do you hear the word "cure," only the word "treatable."

            Most of us have little magnanimity/ generosity for those we find on barstools at happy hour, people spending their time in casinos, even those in a movie theatre. When I was in Leningrad, Russia, for the first time, so many drunk Russians on the streets. I said to a news man from New York, "We will never know how important it is for our fellow human beings to escape." Only when you wear another man's shoes, do you understand what he goes through in his daily life. We all need empathy, a generous spirit in others. Help us to show understanding to those around us, who are probably carrying a burden we know nothing about.

            Most of us do not appreciate our parents until we look back at what they faced. The golden rule seems much more attractive when we realize our personal needs.

And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.

                                                                                                Luke 6:31