My Heart Hurts From Hurting

What. The. F. What is the matter with people? I wrote in my last post that I live in a rose colored world where I believe in the inherent good in people, but the world we live in is testing that belief in big ways.

We live in a world where commercial jet planes are flown into skyscrapers. Where children pre-K through college go to school, not knowing if a shooter, who could be one of their peers, is going to take aim at them. Where someone drives a car through the middle of a known tourist populated area, mowing down crowds. Where bombs detonate in the middle of pop concerts. And where a madman opens fire on festival goers with an automatic weapon from his hotel room.

What. The. F.

My heart hurts from hurting. And none of this takes into account all the people suffering through the recent slew of natural crises doing their damnedest to beat humankind down.

My friend Will posted today on Facebook, “I sometimes feel guilty for bringing my children into this world, and that’s an awful thing to feel and say.” Not a single person persecuted what he was saying. In fact, most people echoed his sentiments. I back him 110%.

Every parent I’ve ever talked to has said some derivative of the same thing, “I want to give my children the world, something better than I had, everything they deserve.” How do you explain what is happening in the world to your children? I honestly want to know because maybe when you’re done with your children, you can try and explain it to me.

As my life hostage and I look down the road to bringing our own children into this world (specifically he would like twin girls – not that he’s got too many lofty demands on my reproductive organs or anything), I have to wonder if I’m going to feel like Will someday, ridden with guilt for leaving a world like to this to the greatest joys in my life. I pray for their sake that I don’t.

I’ve found myself praying a lot lately. I am Roman Catholic but I don’t believe you have to be in a church for God to hear you (this applies in my mind to any religion, not just Catholicism). I also don’t believe that prayer is anything more than a conversation between you and God which is why it often sounds like I’m speaking to any other person in my life when I pray. Prayer doesn’t change God, prayer changes me. It gives me peace, helps me to try and make sense of the senseless.

Recently, I haven’t been getting too much of that from my prayers – peace that is. I want to say it, like any other relationship, goes in phases. I want to say that, but honestly my biggest fear is that this is not a phase. That the world is trying every which way to prove me wrong – that people are not good and that I’m going to be raising children in a world against them at every turn.

This post goes against all the principles I’ve adopted as a writer. I wrote it in an hour and I didn’t look back. Usually I pour over each and every word through the course of several days. It is far more glass half empty than I strive to be. I like to think my glass isn’t full or empty, it’s refillable. And I talk about one of the top taboo subjects – religion.

You’ll have to forgive me all of these transgressions. I’m sure I’ll be myself again soon. Until then, be safe y’all – you matter to me and don’t forget that.

Rachel Olszewski

A hot mess held together on a daily basis by dry shampoo and probiotics, Rachel is still trying to figure out what she wants to be when she grows up but for now is a communications professional by trade. A true Chicagoan through and through, she is an East Coast transplant trying to set down roots. Although the height of her high heels may be getting shorter, Rachel’s expectations are not getting lower and she is on a mission to change the world one person at a time.

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