Changes

Politics, finances, even the day to day mundane events change. It is bewildering sometimes.

The once contentious political debates seem to have taken a turn to the polite. It was nice to watch Palin and Biden as they exchanged ideas without raising their voices. Being the INFP that I am, I have an aversion to that verbal combat. It was great to be able to spend 90 minutes watching the word match the other night. Even the moderator seemed polite. Why is it that a civil debate is so amazing? I suppose because for years one expects every conversation to feel like a Sunday morning network news show.

Here in Nebraska, parents, guardians, and care givers drop wayward wards off at hospitals instead of do battle with out of control teens. A father of ten in Omaha took nine of his children to a nearby hospital to give them up to the custody of the State. Only the oldest, an 18 year old daughter, escaped his desperate decision. His wife had died, the youngest was a baby under two years old. I am sure he was overwhelmed. Safe Haven Laws were perhaps passed too quickly. Meant for newborns and desperate mothers has now become a social service for parents and caregivers who have come to the end of their wits.

We have a friend who experienced a similar thing as a toddler. He and his brothers were taken to an orphanage after his mother died and his own immigrant father could not cope with the ramifications of child care and making a living. His hell began when his dad remarried, brought his children home again and our friend endured the wrath of the evil step-mother.

It all sounds like a Dickens novel. It is too sad for words.