it must be so hard to be a parent and witness this beautiful, innocent, pure newness. freshness. and then to know the horribleness of life. swear words, dirty words, litter in grass in the local park, racism, homophobia, this pressure against you telling you what you should be. the 'fuck you' graffiti in the school corridoor. you want to rub it all away like holden.
i finished the catcher in the rye last night and this poem by plath has reminded me of that. i never noticed when i lost that innocence. i didnt even know. i was probably too young, but when i see it with younger kids it makes me sad. like yr 7s telling me they're 'gonna finger me tonight' as i was walking down to spanish class one afternoon. he wouldnt even know what it ment.
how do you get over that if you're a parent? i suppose there are lots of things we want to keep locked away but fortunately good things should come with bad. without that loss of innocence and growing up there would be so much goodness we would never experience.
''even the bad times were good'' - jean w.