“So what did God say to me in the silence that morning? I’m not sure, but I think God said something like, Don’t try so hard, little child, and, Hey, check out this cool turtle I made.”
― Rachel Held Evans, A Year of Biblical Womanhood

I was excited to spy a baby turtle

on the road the same day I had read those words in a book. Sad to say, this 25-cent-sized baby was no longer living. I am trying not to read anything into that. This is not the story of my life. I.e., This is not "my kind of luck."

Anyone who has followed my posts will know that I have been "open" and willing for God (whatever, whoever God may be) to "enter my heart" and all that. I pray a lot to whoever is listening. I pray night and day, while weeding and doing dishes, while walking dogs. The Catholic "community of saints" and the more universal belief that our lost loved ones live on and watch over us? I want this to be true. "Live as if it is true," believe as if is true, and we create our own reality and make it true, right?

I get the dead baby turtle.

I wish the baby turtle had made it safely across the road, but the possum, the raccoon, and the deer joined baby turtle in Crossing to the Other Side. The sheer quantity, and variety, of road kill is beyond reckoning.

I try to dwell on the good things, not these things. These casualties.

And so I won't even "go there" with the story that during this same week, my sister was hospitalized again. Hearing the pain and misery in her voice left me in tears, and that's all I want to say about that.

The same day I found the turtle, I read a news story of a man and woman who set up their own zoo and got busted for inhumane living conditions for the animals. They're protesting, of course, and claiming the judge shouldn't listen to the witnesses.

When the (couple's) attorney noted that the enclosures at the zoo meet the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s inspection standards, (the District Court Judge) said, “If that’s the case, the USDA requirements are so pale in comparison to what they should be — to give these creatures the freedom to do what they want. I’m not sure any of those USDA members would like to live in those units themselves. I mean, I realize they’re animals and they’re not entitled to live in the Taj Mahal, but it was deplorable.” Owners of Manchester zoo claim bias by judge; Court of Appeals to hear matter

Also on that very same day, someone shared with me this photo of an angry young man.

[source: never to be named!]

I hesitate to explain what is so disturbing about this picture. Let's just say he was a faceless, nameless character in a horror story until I saw this face, and the confessions of a faraway friend became that much more real to me.

He managed to father five children. I am told that he murdered both his sons and got away with it, claiming one had fallen off the bed and the other had fallen down the stairs. Perhaps it is a sign that things do get better in this world that parents no longer are so readily believed. Take this news story from last week:

The parents of a 5-month-old baby who died last year in [the Midwest] are among three people now charged in the infant’s death.

They took this baby girl to a local emergency room.

The baby was treated for abrasions and bruising to her head and ears and released, and hospital staff did not notify police or child services of the injuries.

The next day while again in her father’s care, the baby was found not breathing with no pulse and flown to a [bigger] hospital, where she died days later. An autopsy determined her cause of death was by “a suffocation event of an indeterminate nature.”

Investigators said [this despicable man] and the two other women charged made up a story that the child had been injured by a lamp knocked over by cats.
source: telegraphherald

Also that same day

(when it rains, it pours, no?) I got a letter in the mail from our nephew's wife. At three months along, their baby girl miscarried. They buried this fetus in a cemetery with a granite stone, and the baby's aunt plays her violin over her grave, and the details of this young mother's letter are too poignant to share. This gracious young would-be mother has been unable to conceive again. Her spirit, her faith in God, her kindness are manifest in every particle of her being. If ever any newlyweds were worthy of becoming parents, it was this nephew and his bride.

Denied!

Meanwhile,

The father in that haunting photo is no longer alive on this earth (there is a God!!!), but the damage he did to his daughters is beyond all repair. E.g., there's the "How does one ever recover from the PTSD of this unthinkable event" in which he set fire to the family dog. I will spare you all details. Suffice to say, I am nowhere near as traumatized as this man's daughter is by just HEARING the details. My trauma just picturing this thing that actually happened might register only "one" on a scale of one to ten, while hers is ten exponentially. How am I to forget that I heard this story, how do I unsee that image in my mind?

This now-adult daughter has a counselor who tells her to work toward a state of existence in which she does not try to kill herself or dream of doing so every day. I.e., set your standards low. Don't aspire toward happiness and mental health. Just try not to off yourself, ok, honey? Baby steps. Don't overwhelm her with lofty goals. When/if she attains one level of existence, she can aspire, from there, to a state of contentment or even happiness? Of course, I paraphrase here, but this therapist seems to have very low expectations for this woman whose "daddy issues"(what a euphemism) are so extreme, her version of "On the Bright Side" is that other trauma survivors report having parents who forced them to eat vomit, feces, and other filth, and this woman is grateful to have been spared that.

This woman needs a much brighter Bright Side. I so want to help but so far all I've done is listen and marvel that she has survived. She jumped out of a tree in hopes of killing herself at age six or seven (another story that is not mine to tell). How can we help those who are so brutalized, so traumatized, so severely damaged by the very people who gave us life and were charged with safely raising us to adulthood? I cannot "fix" anyone, which makes it all the harder to keep hearing all these grand claims of The Pentecost (you know, "Descent of the Holy Spirit," the empowering of the faithful, the Bible reading of the day, last week), with Jesus sending out his disciples to heal and cast out demons and speak in tongues, and all. Yeah. Spread love! Spread joy! I cannot even seem to alleviate the pain and suffering of others, much as I want to. My own sadness is a commodity I try to put aside, when I'm not trying to "accept" and "embrace" all emotions, yada yada, you've seen a gazillion posts about this already. The sorrows of others, the joys of others, the business of raising babies and burying our loved ones and moving on. We all have heard. We need to keep hearing the affirmative stuff. Not dwell on the dark stuff.

Time to focus my mental energies on all that is well, all that is right, all that is good.

Painted turtles

are some of the most widespread members of the turtle (Testudines) family in North America. Their name comes from the brightly colored markings on their extremities, which range from yellow, to orange, to red.
The painted turtle lives in slow-moving fresh waters, from southern Canada to northern Mexico, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

.... Humans do have an impact on these turtles, but they are widespread and numerous enough that it typically doesn’t impact their population....habitat destruction and road kills being the most impactful. Thankfully, this species is able to easily adapt and can even live in man-made lakes and ponds, allowing it to continue thriving.

source: animals.net/

They are numerous.

They are thriving.

Most of them thrive, or enough of them thrive, anyway.

And that is my "takeaway" on this Memorial Day, a day to remember the fallen, including the 5-month-old girl slain by her own father, the two brothers slain by their dad, and one little painted turtle on the side of the road.

May we all cross the road safely and make it to the other side.