Experience

Experience... very important... And where do we get experiences? From our day to day lives and from stories our friends and family have... and from books and movies and plays...

And who has the most experience? Well... hard to tell and if you say to someone -- I have more experience then you... and I am older and wiser and you will never have more experience than me... that is POWER... and in fact a child gets hurt by such power... and it is not fair nor is it true.

SO many LIES.... I grew up with so many statements and assertions which were lies, power plays... and essentially abusive!

I was abused. I am older now and a good deal better... but I guess I have scars and maybe shame, too. I am more embarrassed then ashamed... I may not know the difference and I may not really get SHAME... but I was abused... psychologically and physically... Fortunately not sexual (really) but emotional and the physical and the psychological. It sucked!

Today - 50 or so years later that past still is remembered. Forgotten - NO. Forgiven -- well not so much as the perpetrators have never asked for my forgiveness nor do I expect they ever will. They think they were right, I'm sure... Nevertheless - I forgive myself since that is all that is possible AND I stay away from them (parents and sister... even as they are alive) ... for that distant past and for psychological stuff done even in the last 5 to 10 years.

It is interesting to think I was treated so badly partly because I was a male... and it is a question as to what my sister experienced... she who is 65 years old (I'm 69) and who is tied at the hip to her parents... and who never married or had a family of her own... Probably saved some children from the cycle of abuse... maybe... Who knows? I used to care... and I didn't do enough, I think, when I might have.. I didn't want the responsibility... for how she might have fared if she ever broke with her mom and dad... I guess I once was ashamed of shirking that task... that responsibility?

We are in many ways responsible for others.. some close, some distant, some family, some strangers... and I am ashamed of the many things I could/might have done for others that were not done..

EXPERIENCE... it comes from many sources and it comes in time... And maybe I am ok... Or good enough ... OR FINE.