Lesson from Ralphie

We’re angry because we can’t believe the things he just said, and they’re angry because they believe the thing he just said. At the end of the day we are all ANGRY!! We are stewing in ANGER and we are drowning in HATE! This is NOT us! This is definitely not me! Sometimes I am so angry at the situation, I take my temper and frustrations out on the ones I love and this is ridiculous. It does not surprise me; a rational human being, when I hear that someone irrational has gone off the bend and done something hateful and irreversible. Something they can never fix, change, turn back; something that we all have to live with forever.

Today, October 28, 2018 is my Ralphie’s Gotcha Day. It was 18 years ago, that we brought him home. The day I got a shot of unconditional love in the heart… the kind that was supposed to last a lifetime. Lately I am ripping through layers of disgust, pain, and anger to find it. I know it’s there, buried deep, and I will find it. I remember how all of Ralphie’s life, if I ever was upset, sad or angry, and the tone of my voice or my body language showed it, he immediately got up and left the room. He couldn’t bear to be around that version of me, and he was my Velcro dog. The minute I saw him walk out of the room was my cue to calm down, to call him back because I was his Velcro human. Ralphie wouldn’t want to be in the same home as me right now, let alone the same room, and if he was here he would show me exactly how he felt. How can I let him and his legacy of unconditional love down!?

So today in honor of Ralphie, my always loved boy, I choose to #TuneHimOut and block the hateful rhetoric. I choose to turn to love, and kindness; to not assume that this situation in our beautiful country is hopeless. I choose Hope. I will go out of my way to do something nice for someone, every day! And I encourage you to do the same. Let’s bring humanity back from this precipice that we are teetering on; let’s hold on to one another, save ourselves, and let’s make this a better world for our children.