Here There and Everywhere

Outraged Innocence

We learn so much about ourselves when we bear children. As Mothers, we learn the least glamorous of all virtues: self-sacrifice, endurance, patience, steadfastness and then more self-sacrifice. Caring for a newborn baby is an endless lesson in performing in spite of sleep loss, the drudgery of feeding and caring for a being who cannot in any way care for him or herself, and the realization that life will never again be the same.

And every now and then, you get the great pay off, a great gift that makes it all worthwhile. For me, it was the first time my son came home from college, majoring in Criminal Justice, and couldn’t wait to tell me what he had learned.

“Mom, the prisons are full of poor people who committed small crimes, many because they are poor! And there are rich people who cheat thousands of people of millions of dollars, and they go free!”

He was outraged. He could not understand how a country like ours could be so unfair to a majority of its citizens.

Later, as he continued with his studies, he confronted us. “We’re like the rich! Do you know anybody who has spent time in prison? There are entire communities who know how to deal with ‘the system’ because they have family members in prison!” Once again, he was outraged, and he had begun to understand what privilege is all about.

I couldn’t have been more proud. I couldn’t take any credit; he had discovered all this on his own. I was proud to have a son who could be outraged by injustice.

He has grown into a good man. He serves justice, as best he can. There are times when he will look me in the eye and tell me cynically “there is no justice; there is only winning and losing” but I see him out there, fighting the good fight against what appear to be overwhelming odds, and I know that motherhood, and all its sacrifices, is worth it to have a son with a good heart.

October 29, 2026 - Posted by intlxpatr | Aging, Character, Community, Law and Order, Parenting, Values