August 29, 2010

• Reading Again

  When I was younger, I would enroll in the summer reading program at the library every year. I would read tons and tons and tons of books. My dad or my brothers would take me and we’d spend all day at the library then I’d go home with a pile of books in my arms. I would trade books with my cousins and I’d get everyone into the Harry Potters series (back before it was a culture). Once I learned how to go online and use AIM and AsianAvenue and Myspace and whatever I stopped reading. I would read random facts online all day but never a full book.

  A few weeks ago while waiting in Target for my friends, I browsed by the book section and ended up reading some summaries. I picked up A Child Called It and Lovely Bones. In 2 days I came back and picked up Loose Girl and Please Stop Laughing At Me.
  
  A Child Called It is a true story about the third-worst case of child abuse in California. Just in the neighboring city next to me a loving mother turned on her eldest son and physically and mentally abused him. She shunned him from the family, turning everyone against him, not even feeding him so that he had to steal food from school. She severely beat and burned him. She made him work to the bone to only feed him his own vomit. And his fire fighter of a father just stood by and watched since he had no power over the mother. The story is written through the voice of the little boy. Faced with hatred from his own family and classmates, he fought hard every moment just to stay alive. I became so angry reading this book, it brought me to tears. Obviously the mom has some mental disorder that should be treated, that or punished. Then on top of that, I was so angry at the dad for allowing his child to be so severely abused. Instead of standing up for his child, he himself becomes a victim.

  Lovely Bones is a fictional story about a young girl who is raped and murdered by her neighbor. She then goes to heaven and watches her family, friends, and neighbors over the next decade. Her family falls apart when her dad becomes obsessed with catching her murderer. Meanwhile her mom sees this as an opportunity to leave the family, something she never wanted in the first place. She has an affair and then abandons the family and lives life how she wants by herself across the country. The young girl just watches everyone’s lives unravel without much event. Again, serious lack of parenting going on.

  Loose Girl is also a true story about a girl with a mother who becomes emotionally overbearing when her husband divorces her. As a result, her mom abandons her daughters to follow her own dreams and the main character goes to live with her dad, who has no idea how to raise girls and treats them as his friends instead of his daughters. He encourages drinking, drugs, and sex. The main character grows up trying to desperately find love by sleeping with over 40 guys over a few years. Instead she finds hatred for herself.

  Please Stop Laughing At Me is a true story about a girl who has a very happy childhood. Her parents teach her to be a good person and to stand up for herself, which lands her as a target of bullying after she stands up against her friends when they tease the retarded kids at school. The bullying gets so bad that she transfer school where again she becomes a target after she unintentionally gets her 12 year old peers in trouble for having a sex party. Her parents give her bad advice on ignoring the bullying, which makes it worst and her teachers turn away saying she shouldn’t be a tattle.The verbal bullying becomes physical bullying and eventually her parents believe that their daughter is to blame. They drag her to psychiatrists who puts her on drugs and physical exercise techniques.

  I never knew being a kid was so hard. My little heart breaks for theirs.

  And I can’t believe that their parents, who are supposed to protect them and love them are the ones either intentionally or unintentionally hurting them. No parents are perfect but these stories are just so sad.

  PLEASE parents and parent-to-bes… LOVE YOUR CHILDREN!

  Oh, and buy them lots of good books. I bought a book at Borders today for the Fundraiser that allows you to buy books for children in homeless shelters. I bought Green Egg & Ham. I hope some kid enjoys it as much as I enjoyed receiving books for gifts, especially silly books : )

  • 1:44 am
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