45
“Yup – I screwed up again….”
2-??-08
Tonight’s
a night I will never 4get.
Hopefully I can look back at this & laugh but Right now things are
pretty dag-gum serious. Me-n-Binky
stole the car2 go help Mac—ahh.
I’ll write more later but
I’m calling it a night since it is already 4a.m….
I will
strive2 be better.
In
Christ
Heather
Marie Lee
Dear Heather,
Yup. It is pretty dag-gum serious. Let’s see. You are 15 and barely have a driving permit – let alone
experience driving a car. You snuck out in the middle of the night after we
went to bed. You and Binky stole
our car. You even got followed by a sherrif and managed to avoid getting stopped. (For the record, I
would have left you with the police (or at juvenile detention) for the night so
you could get a feel for the consequences of some of your decisions. And yes. I love you that much.)
And the scariest part is that you got stuck on the train tracks when a
train was coming because you didn’t even know enough of the driving rules to
know that you have to stop BEFORE the big white line when the railroad lights
start flashing!! How did we miss
that lesson?
Overall, you
barely escaped death and destruction.
A few days ago
you said you wanted that free and easy feeling, but not the bad kind! I hope this isn’t what you meant.
You claim that
you weren’t trying to do anything
wrong – you just wanted to rescue your very drunk 15-year-old
friend. What baffles me is that
you didn’t even know where he was or how to get there even if you did know his
location. You just started
driving. Or should I say
attempting to drive -- with the idea that somehow – in a city of thousands –
you would find him and be able to rescue him.
And the irony is
that you were just recently remembering the anniversary of Hannah’s death at
these very same tracks. I think I
told you then that you would remember her and be cautious for a while and then
you would forget the lessons her death could teach you. Obviously, you forgot.
You put yourself
and Binky at risk without thinking through what you could actually do to help
him. You put all the other people
out that night at risk. Remember
how long it took me to overcome the fact that a drunk driver’s decision to
drink and drive controlled me and my life for over year. He didn’t have that right. You don’t either. I’m grateful no one else was hurt.
And the truth is
- if this boy really needed help – you weren’t doing him any good.
It simply makes
no sense. I can understand that
you felt the need to rescue him.
Especially since you seem to be holding yourself responsible for his
faith. But you had to know that
you weren’t equipped to rescue him.
And if you didn’t
know before – you must have figured it out pretty quickly. The police. The train. The
ditch. Something should have clued
you in. All that happened before
you were 5 miles from home.
What makes your father
and I so angry is that you keep making ridiculous decisions when you have
reasonable options. Yet –
repeatedly - you simply react without thinking – hoping that you will figure it out as you go. What is so crazy is that we have told
you repeatedly that we are willing to help you – no questions asked -- even if
it is the middle of the night.
Heather. Think about it. The State calls us in the middle of the
night to take children and teens in crisis into our home. We have fostered and/or adopted somewhere
in the neighborhood of 30 kids – mostly teens. We take troubled teenagers into our home to LIVE with
us. I teach teenagers. You of all people know that people call
me 24/7 to help them solve or think through all kinds of problems. This is my life.
So why do you
think that we won’t help you? Why do you not trust us to help your
friends? Why are you so determined
to do things your way – even when the results never work out the way you want?
We can’t stop
your thoughts, but we have a parental responsibility to physically stop you
from doing things that will hurt you or someone else. I hate that you feel the
need to do this on your own.
And trying to
help friends without parental involvement does nothing to help them. If this
boy really has an alcohol problem and you really want to help him, then YOU
can’t do it alone. It is really
egotistical and wrong to believe that you have it together enough to rescue him
from his problems. You can be a
friend. But you cannot be a
Savior.
And your friends
can’t help you enough. You still
need help from people with the knowledge, skill and wisdom to help this boy
help himself. Or to protect him
from himself if that’s what he needs. You owe it to him to talk to his parents about what
you know. If you really care about
him, you will tell the people who are in the best position to help him.
Anything else
really just makes it all about you.
He may be angry
with you, but does that really matter if you want what is best for him?
As for you and Binky,
Dad and I will have to think about the consequences that make sense for your
choices. It isn’t about punishment
– because that won’t stop your intense desire to help others and your belief
that you can make a difference.
It’s about learning from this horribly dangerous situation. It’s about re-evaluating your thought
process and decision making skills.
It’s about your fantasy versus reality.
And it’s also
about trust. Again. I can’t trust you to make good
decisions. Once again, I will have trouble trusting your word. It’s clear you don’t trust your father
and I to help you. This has been a
core problem for us for years. I
don’t know how to escape or avoid that natural consequence. But that is the very nature of trust.
Once breached or broken, it takes a lot to rebuild that internal feeling that
allows us act and make decisions simply based on what someone else says or
does. It’s a feeling of the heart
as much as anything else. You – of
all people – know that you can’t force your heart to trust.
I love you
anyway.
Mom
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