A Reason To Come Back

Man it's been forever since I've typed on here.  I've had the desire and the want to but the time has been escaping me, and the list of excuses has been mounting.  Back to the grind I will go though, and get this ball back rolling...

A few weeks ago I was at a school.  A kid and his gang went to a local park and got beat up by a rival gang.  He was upset about this so he concocted a story about being jumped and he was going to retaliate by bringing a gun to his school to handle his business.  Needless to say, there was a significant amount of police presence at the school that day.  A co-worker talked to the kids mom and instructed her to leave her son at home that day and that if he showed on campus he would be arrested.

Fast forward to this week.  In the past three weeks at this school, a 14 year old kid died from an overdose of heroin.  3 kids just this week self-admitted to their addiction and checked into rehab.  One of those 3 kids was the kid that was supposed to bring the gun that Monday morning.  They were all friends with the deceased kid. Every one knew him.  He was not a gang member nor a "bad kid" but he had been using heroin since middle school.  As his chase of the dragon became worse, he started mixing his heroin with Zanax.  This proved deadly.  A few nights before his death, he gave a friend of his all his user names and passwords to his emails, video games, social networks, and cell phone.  It's as if he knew this information was going to be needed.  Sad thing is, his friend took them and did not ask the important questions.  Nor did he inform his parents or any adults at his school.  A few days later, his friend was dead.

Thursday afternoon I stood in front of 230 9th graders from the school.  I tried to teach them about the dangers of drugs without giving them any new ideas.  I made eye contact with the kids I had worked with in the past due to their gang affiliations.  And as I closed my presentation to them, I let them know that we as parents have failed them.

I can only hope that as I continue to speak to kids, I can one day tell them that we as parents, and as a society, are no longer failing them.