Easier Said Than Done

We all know the definition of insanity: "Doing the same thing in the same way and expecting a different outcome."  Les Brown always says, "If we knew better, we would do better!"  Well, I've no idea how to get my kid to Europe on a shoestring, so I have got to build a bridge from what I do know outward.  I've got to stand on what I know, and reach out toward the unknown.  It's scary.  Malachi is too afraid even to attempt it.  We've tried this before.  He remembers what happened.  I remember him dropping to his knees when he found out he would not be going on an educational retreat because I had not raised the money, and the scholarship application had closed.  Educational marketing is such that I was forced to do a fundraiser in order to be eligible for the scholarship.  The scholarship closed unexpectedly a day or so after I'd raised $300 to send them.  I had to tell Malachi.  I did not know it would break his heart.  Seven years later, his apathy tells me it's STILL broken.  He won't even try.

I've been tryna help myself and this kid a long time, and I'll never stop.

His non-involvement is hard on me.  I feel like I'm plugging away on his future without any input from him.  I vacillate between wanting to chuck the entire endeavor and stage-managing this whole thing without him.  He's got some awesome music on my hard drive.  I've been asking him for permission to shop it so he can pay his OWN daggone way!  He has slow-walked me since OCTOBER.  If he went to school one day and could not take a step for the throngs of people complementing him on his most recent beats, he would think I've done him wrong.  Even if it turned out for the best.  I know him.  This is what I mean by the convenience of stuck-ness.  That boy knows I respect him and his intellectual property so much that I won't administer it without his permission, even for his own good.  What he doesn't seem to comprehend is that I know what I'm doing.  No pedophile or perpetrator or poseur wants to take ME on. Not anymore, anyway.  I can destroy your credibility by means of a single hashtag, and I have done it.  No more posting black women bound with ball gags on my kid's profile for YOU, Dr. Cyanide.  I know the Godfather.

It's time to order a passport.  I'd have done it by now, but as you see, I'm panhandling this thing on my own.  Another few weeks and I won't be able to get it done in time.  I don't want to fail Malachi, even as he is busy failing himself.  He has insulated himself from reality.  If he doesn't do anything, there's no disappointment to be felt.  If I don't pull this off, he can tell himself it was never meant to be.  I've been listening here on The Plus.  I cannot allow my son to embrace this pattern of avoidance!  It will ruin his life.

I don't give up.  I don't back down.  I try to learn from Disappointment and Defeat.  One thing those two will never willingly teach you is how to WIN.  You have to FIGHT to wrest that knowledge from those two old instructors.  Their class is free, and you can enroll on a minute-to-minute basis.

Thanks for taking the time to read this blog.
#FriendsofMalachiMaxwellGlass