There are Good Guys Out There

It’s true. There’s always a story about a good guy pulling out the right attitude to save the day. Stories abound. I confess to not seeing them, or not reading them, or sometimes not even believing them.

What is it about the movement of my time through this life that’s changed the way I respond to these things? I used to be nice. I used to believe. I used to do the right thing. I think.

Is it the life I had with so many foster kids? Or the foster animals that would’ve been put down purely for the lack of social skills? Is it the many more stories of cons and scams and – the worst of all – the powers that be who deem all below their rank and power and privilege to be irrelevant?

See? Cynicism at its worst. How can a person continue to trust, to have faith in their fellow human beings, to be willing to put in more than they get when what they see, feel, get is not done in the interests of the whole, of no benefit to any but the One Who Speaks Loudest and from the Highest Chair in the Land. Might beats Right.

And fancy saying these things at this time of year.

Yes, it’s that time of year. Forgiveness and all that. I suck in a breath and look sideways to see if anyone’s looking as I think this through. Forgiveness. It should have a question mark. Forgiveness? That’s better.

Will I ever forgive the person who tried to drown me when I was a kid? Nope. Simple answer to that one.

Will I ever forgive the ——– who sexually abused me? Nope. Another simple answer.

Will I ever forgive the person or people who abused, neglected and abandoned the ones who came into my care? Nope. Never. It was their responsibility to do the best they could to leave them with the skills to become contributing members of their society. No forgiveness for those who practice cruelty as if it were a gift of enlightenment.

Will I forgive the man who enables other (usually) men to abuse, degrade and humiliate women, children, dark-haired, brown-eyed, accent-voiced people who are not the same as him, and don’t follow his religion? No. Not ever. I will never forgive those who continue to exhort his values either. Never.

I am lacking in the willingness to forgive tyrants and harbingers of evil.

I need to read more stories of the good guys.

Please, I beg you, send me those stories. I need to see more of them. To find the two examples in the first para, I scrolled through 14 pages (yes, pages with ten or more stories on each page) of the other stuff.

It’s time we started to spread the word about the good guys.

Something like this place.

And what would I have done without this guy? He saved me from the depths of [that place].

 

[image error]

Slim, named for his voice (see Slim Dusty), Writer in Residence; One of the rescued – too old to be retrained as a house cat, apparently.

 

that’s my end of year post – 2017 wasn’t a good year – and I promise much more light in the next twelve months. Unless …