Cry me a river!
Why? Because you have earned the right to!
So what happened to you from days gone by? Have you allowed it to surface yet or are you keeping it repressed and sealed and bottled up from within? Have you reached your stage of being able to forgive and let it all go?
Let me take you back 43 years and paint for you a vivid word picture.
I am at that time a young 15 year old, handsome high school student in grade 10. My experiences from grade 1 to 8 were from what I can see normal and my world was unfolding for me as it should. Girls liked me a lot and I liked to kiss them and be their friends. My grades came with ease and especially literature studies caught my total attention.
Then it was time for grade 9 and the big grown up move to a newly developing high school. I became a “day student” at a Christian Brother resident all boys college and some of the worst feelings and best feelings of my entire life began to percolate.
The Beatles and their great music had just arrived to North America and the Honda Scooter was the rage. Yes, my eyes were devouring the beautiful glimpses of female “eye candy” from the all girls high school a block away. Life was wonderful as it should be. I wore my heart on my sleeve and I truly loved everyone around me.
To summarize that grade 9 year is to project a complete disaster because the new college was under construction and as jack hammers loudly banged and clanged incessantly, that year seemed to be a litany of watching teacher’s moving lips and we as students sat wondering what they were talking about.
I thank my Creator for the momentum I had from grade 8 that got me through to grade 10 still with a great thirst for knowledge. I was ready to take on with full positive energy this grade 10 year. The jack hammers were silent now and we were all in a brand new college. I also noticed the numerous new members of teaching staff that had been imported from Eastern Canada.
I was eager, ready and willing with unleashed teenage energy. What could go wrong for me?
Well, let me share this with you. Keep in mind that being a “day student”, I now know, I only got a small peek at what was surrounding my young life there.
Tough and strong was the thick deep respect demanding air of that institution. Army Military training was a recognized subject. My only safeguard was that I got to walk home after classes had ended. The many other “resident” students, had to stay there.
The second day of this new school year was pierced by a tall, very dark shadow of a figure with raven black hair. He was a Christian Brother and he was going to teach Social Studies. Roaming in his pitch black robe, his over-starched religious collar seemed to be constantly strangling him as he would vigorously twitch is chin forward as if he needed to rip it off his neck forever. He did not look like a man of the cloth. He seemed imprisoned.
I will forever call him Brother Black Bart. My experience with Bart began quickly. After entering the classroom, like a crooked witch’s index finger he gestured me to the front of the room. I was sporting a sexy Beatle’s shirt and a new, first day worn down jacket, a gift from my parents. As I walked up to the front of the classroom he was presenting his postured smile. I returned a heart felt smile.
He asked me to take off my jacket. I did as I thought he was impressed with it’s quality and style, wanting to show my classmates. I will describe to you the humbling and embarrassing “show and tell” that ensued through Black Bart’s approach to unsuspecting humanity.
He took my jacket and with sudden deep anger threw it on the floor. He then proceeded to walk all over it (that was my pride he was deliberately stepping on) and wipe his black scuffed and unpolished shoes on my new defense for the coming winter winds. I stood there frozen as my youthful energetic smile faded to dismay as my classmates sat there frozen also in total shock.
Somehow at that very point in time, a foreboding dark future was unfolding right before our very eyes. I for one knew we had a very troubled man on our hands. Impending danger lurked from to every corner of the classroom. It was like the demons from the very bowels of Hell were now in that room.
“May these halls of learning have mercy on us”, was my silent prayer.
Black Bart, beaming with his now captured power, told me to kneel in front of him, his chin twitching in a forward motion as if still trying to free himself. His religious strangle hold had seemed to tighten around his neck. Since I had been an alter boy for over 7 years I found kneeling easy and with reflex motion I thought nothing of it.
Suddenly, whack! The first ferocious slap across the right side of cheek stung and startled me. From the pain, tears instantly and uncontrollably weld up for all my classmates to see. Shame rushed over me for the first time in my entire life like a searing blow torch. The second slap to my left cheek sent me to a numb place where I seemingly left my body and watched this dismantling of a fine young student taking hold.
Three horrible years passed while being subjected to Black Bart’s entertainment and my love for learning was totally destroyed. This humiliation finally stopped for two reasons.
1. I was now a strapping 6 foot 4 inches tall young man and was very able to take this weak spineless individual on. He could see my finish line approaching.
2. He suddenly left mid year to get married. Can you imagine where that harmful daisy chain of pain infliction ended up?
To cut long, long stories short, I now after so many years of progressive success proudly call myself a CEO. Translated in my mind it means, Continuous Eternal Optimist. It has served me very well.
After many long years, I have forgiven Brother Bart and my empathy goes to him directly to pondering his childhood and how miserable life must have been for him.
So yes, I say to you, “Cry Me A River”, because it is a river of tears that must purge and cleanse this seemingly indelible pain. Yes, cry, cry, and cry again.