Prior to going to bed last night, a surge of excitement flowed through me. Initially, it was apprehension because I didn’t know how to start this blog. But apprehension soon gave away to excitement as I began to formulate how this blog was going to shape up. Excitement became resolve as I was determined to write something that would set your hearts and minds on fire. But when I got to the office this morning, I was greeted, first by a message, and then a phone call from a grieving mother who had given birth over the weekend. She was now at home but her baby was still in the hospital. I asked if the baby tested positive for drugs. She said she didn’t know but she had. She used powdered cocaine two days before the baby was born.
A few minutes later, my supervisor told me that I needed to be on standby because a mother, who had her three children with her at home on a trial home basis, was about to have her children brought back into care because she tested positive for cocaine at her last drop. I would be needed to assist with transporting the children to their next placement. The thought that kept echoing through my mind after each tidbit was dropped on me was “my God, when are we going to change?”
But the real question becomes, “what do you do about it?” Do you commiserate with them and that’s the last of it until you hear from them again? Or do you find some way of connecting them with resources that will help them overcome this 800 pound gorilla that is on their back. Do I judge them and say, what the hell, they’ll never change? Or do I look at them the way I would want someone to look at me and say, in time, we can overcome this?
There was a time when I would have looked at both of these women and said they’ve made their beds now they have to lie in them. There would have been a time when I would have simply said, the chickens are coming home to roost. But truly I have come to realize that but for the grace of God that could be me. As I grow and evolve as an individual, I have come to find that each of us has a purpose in life. Sometimes through the clouds of despair and hopelessness we lose sight of that purpose, get off track and never seem to find our way back home. But when I do get home, or at least recognize that I need to be home, I need to help pick up the lives that have been strewn over the highway of life.
I think whatever we do should be done with a purpose. Like this blog. There has to be a purpose in it for me. Maybe, just maybe, it can become a place where ideas are exchanged; where we can take those ideas and refine them and put shape and force to them so that they are the catapult for change that we need. This change can be on a personal level or even on a community level. For the personal level, you can send me your situation and I’ll only share what you want me to share and perhaps we can help others avoid your pitfalls. E-mail me at gwjacobsauthgor@yahoo.com.
In all you do, be well. 
