If you're of a certain generation you may remember a line from the classic cartoon, Broom-Stick Bunny. Hotly pursued by a hideous and scary witch, and about to become part of her brew, the usually wise-cracking Bugs Bunny is suddenly reflective about his pursuer:
"She may not be very pretty now, but she was someone's baby once."
I think about that line every once in a while. Everyone...no matter how grumpy or dirty or beautiful or thin or strong or mean or ugly or wrinkled or rude or happy or hurtful...everyone was "someone's baby once." Remembering that helps me to love better--even those who may seem particularly unlovable to me at the moment. Because, you see, while it's true that we all started out the same--small and naked and helpless--from there it didn't work out the same for all of us. Some of us entered into worlds of abundant love, privilege and care, but many did not. Sure, we were all "someone's baby once," but we weren't all loved. Some of us were abandoned. Some of us were abused. Some of us were bullied. Some of us were rejected because of the color of our skin or the kink in our hair or the people we loved or the things we were good at doing. Some of us were starved--for food, for affection, for love.
Many still are.
Friends, we all make choices based on the opportunities that exist for us in our world, from the foundations on which our lives began. But what of those who have no foundation, whose lives are built on the shaky ground of rejection and starvation? We may all have been worthy of love but we have not all been recipients of it. It may be hard for some of us to imagine, but there are many in this world who have simply never experienced that loving gaze that tells us, no matter what, we are loved and all will be well.
Maybe it's time we tell them.
(c) Fiechter, 2016
Thanks for reading. Please feel free to share--ask permission for reprinting please. And remember, love is both a noun and a verb...and sometimes actions speak louder than words.
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