After 17+ years of taking the hour-long trip to Hickville for all of the kids’ events, my husband and I are not exactly disappointed that the need for those trips is quickly dwindling. No matter how many times I have been there, I find myself just looking around, shaking my head in disbelief and disgust.
Hickville is a small town, but certainly not in the charming sense. I am from a small town, and I have never seen anything like Hickville. It’s more like an inbred cult than a town. Small minds, big mouths. They are proud of their ignorance and tackiness. The louder and trashier, the better.
No one who cares about the kids’ futures would ever have dragged them to that town. No one who loves the kids would have forced them to try to grow and learn and flourish in a place like that, where enlightenment is scorned, and morphing into another mindless clone is the norm.
The only reason the kids were compelled to grow up in such a stifling, asinine environment is so that Psycho could spare herself from ever facing a single adult responsibility. She greedily refuses to stray from her daddy’s perpetual handouts, letting him think for her, coddle her, pay her bills, even offer up the shack she currently freeloads in. Over 50 years old, and she has never, not once, stood on her own two feet. It’s hard to do that when she lives shamelessly on her knees and refuses to be anything but pathetic.
The youngest child graduates soon. The kids’ opportunity for a decent, basic education is gone. They were forced to attend one of the worst schools in the state, thanks to Psycho. I don’t think they realize yet how much this has wounded them, or how much she doesn’t care.
Even worse is the attitude that leaving that wasteland of a town is some kind of crime. It’s like the adults in that town know that if kids leave, they will realize what a shit hole that town really is, and how backward and uncultivated all the adults are. So they smash their wings, suppress their ambitions, stuff them into whatever cages they can dream up to trap them there.
We attended an event at my stepdaughter’s school the other night. Looking around, I understood Psycho’s refusal to leave. She fully belongs there–a cheap clown in a dysfunctional circus.
Let her stay there and rot, then. But locking the kids up and holding them down should not make anyone happy. Not anyone who truly cares about them.
I hope the kids open their eyes to the entire world just waiting outside of that absurd joke of a town. I hope they find the courage to explore, to learn, to discover opportunities and experiences available to them if they just step out of that damn cage. I hope they are curious, independent, willing to take chances, and strong enough to build their own lives, freedom, dreams, and happiness.
Sweat & Sparkle 