Compassionately Man

A friend is torn to pieces trying to understand why her son cannot see what she sees in his daughter or love his daughter as she loves her. Why does that seem so difficult? A father wants to be a part of his son’s life, help him grow into a good man. His ex-wife refuses or makes it extremely difficult out of jealousy and spite more than anything else. Who is hurt the most? The one thought of the least, the child. I listen to these stories and analyze every aspect of it made available to me yet cannot wrap my mind around it well enough to acquire a resolve, let alone a simple thought. But then a chain of events took place in my own life and it was all that I could think about. I want to share with you things you may not know about me, something that I experienced recently, and how I reacted to it. There are a lot more people that know me yet really don’t know me than there are people that really know me. I have been shot, stabbed, and cut many times. I lost part of a finger on my miter saw and said damn going to need a stitch in that. I hit a 4×4 post at my mom’s out of anger with my fist, the pain was excruciating. That made me angrier and I hit it again. I shattered my wrist in five places and required surgery. I told my daughter I think I broke something. When my back hurts about a five to me on a scale of 1-10 I’ll work, a lot would call it a 10 and be curled up on a couch. I have an extremely high tolerance for pain. I pick up black widow spiders and copperhead snakes. I laugh going through the horror houses on Halloween. I have seen death and held dying men in my arms trying to comfort them. I have fought and I have hurt people. I have been through a lot, and I have learned a lot. I believe I could safely say if being tough has anything to do with being a man, I can hang with the best. You can be assured also I have love and compassion for others. I can see and feel their pain too. I ran across a video recently put out by: “Hope for Paws”. There was a small puppy covered with mange sitting on what looked like an empty potato chip bag in the bottom of a cement drainage canal with about an inch of water in it. When the guy got close to it and reached out to pet it, the puppy just sat there, as if it had given up on life. It was so sad. Then the guy got closer and could see more of that puppy and he cried… “Oh God, it looks like someone literally cut off one of his feet”. My eyes began to fill with tears. I could only imagine what this poor puppy must have gone through. My sad tears soon turned to happy tears because that puppy recovered, found love, and although he is missing a back leg… you would never know it just to watch him play and enjoy living his new life. Then and now my sorrow is more toward the people that could have done something like that to that puppy. A person capable of such an act cannot begin to imagine what it is to love or be loved. My sorrow is toward the fathers that don’t acknowledge their children or show them the love they should. A father that can deny his own flesh and blood is destined to live a sad and lonely life eventually dying alone and soon forgotten. My sorrow is toward the mothers that would keep their children from their fathers thinking they are hurting the fathers. The children are the ones that get hurt. The children are the ones that want you and your love in their lives. You helped create them, they need you. They need you to think of them and their needs every bit as much as you do your own. Rest assured just like the puppy in the story I shared with you, they will get over it in time, they will find that love they sought in you elsewhere and they will be happy in their new lives. They will have learned a great lesson from you, one they will teach their own children. You will soon grow old and find yourself alone, your friends will be with their families, you… well, you’ll be wishing you had a family. You can be as tough as any man and still have a heart. You can endure the worst pain and still openly love someone or something. You can cry, literally fall to your knees and cry like a baby all while being a tough man. I can promise you that on everything I love. Don’t deprive yourself of something you can only feel and know through your heart by hiding yours behind the illusion of masculinity.
Simply My Thoughts
Dean Butler