Broken Dreams

It's funny, but before I had a computer, I used to do a lot of writing on scraps of paper or single sheets of paper, fold them up and put them somewhere, and eventually I come across some of those things when I'm cleaning or looking for something else.

This folded up piece of paper was found by me about ten minutes ago as I was doing some fall cleaning here in my den. Wow, it's from 21 years and 2 days ago, and it was written shortly after our son decided he was too grown up for us anymore and he had moved out to be on his own, and suffice to say, it was not a popular move or one that his mother or myself ever really understood or got over.

Funny, things haven't seemed to change all that much where he is concerned, even to this day. He lives his own life with no contact with us, and he keeps his sons away from us by his choice as well.

I used to wonder what I had done wrong, but now, I realize, that it wasn't anything my wife or I had done, but it was his selfishness and his lack of love and respect for us. Funny how selfishness can take away so much from one's life.

I hold no hope for him to ever change, hell, he's going to be 40 years old on his next birthday. Selfishness and self-centeredness is much like a terminal disease, and in most cases an incurable one as well.

I can't help but wonder if he ever stops and realizes what he has not only taken away from himself but what he has deprived my grandsons of having. Somehow I doubt that is the case.

Anyway, like I said, this poem captures feelings I had over 21 years ago, and I decided to post it here so I can throw the original writing of it away in the trash, kind of like our son threw our lives away into the trash all those years ago.


Broken Dreams (written November 15, 1991)

For eighteen years he gave me reason
To get up and face each day.
But now my incentive to live my life full
Has packed up and moved away.

It's not just the fact that he's moved away
That is hurting myself and my wife,
But for some unknown reason we don't understand
We're no longer a part of his life.

Now I know we aren't perfect as all parents aren't,
Although I thought we were better than most.
And that special closeness I thought we all shared,
I imagined it all, I suppose.

I mean what do you say to a son that you love
Probably more than your own life itself?
You can't say, "You'll live here and do as I say,
And damnit, you'll love us or else."

I just hope he realizes we'll always be here
And stand behind him thru good times and bad.
And we're not the bad montsters he thinks that we are,
We're just simply, his Mom and his Dad.