Spilled Milk

by K.L. Randis

You’s standing in the middle of a field and two things are happening. It’s rainin’ and there’s a tornado off in the distance. I mean, it’s a twirling, killer tornado, coming right toward you. You can feel the rain soaking you as you watch this tornado. Which one of those things you gonna notice first, the rain or the tornado?” “The tornado,” I said. “Why?” “I don’t know. It’s scarier? It can hurt you.” “Now let’s assume that tornado goes away. The threat is gone. Now are you gonna notice the rain?” “Yeah.” “Why?” “’Cause I’d probably be getting wet and cold, I would notice that.” “You had somethin’ in your life so powerful and frightening it took your full attention. It was more threatening, and could hurt you worse. That tornado was Earl. Now that the tornado has gone away, your focus shifts. See? The rain was there all along, your mama always was the way she is now, you just didn’t notice it.”

“You were in survival mode, Brooke. You did what you did to survive. You cleaned your mama’s house, and you looked after them children like they was your own ’cause she was too high to be bothered herself. She used you, honey, because she could. Now that you got rid of her means of living, she’s got a whole lot of responsibility that’s new to her. The manipulation she tries to pull on you, that selfishness, it was there all along child. You just had bigger things to worry about, and she never had to use it before.”

“Just remember, rain doesn’t seem all that threatening at first, but too much rain can turn into a flood.”

“You can have four people go through something exceptionally traumatic, and one of those people will have a higher resiliency to coping. They won’t turn to drugs or rebel against society, they’ll seek the positive in any given situation. Now the interesting thing is the argument whether resiliency is nature or nurture. Are we born with it, or is it taught to us?”

Just what makes one child so susceptible to crumbling under situations another one simply rises above?”