From my latest endeavor, “Shadows Across the Pond,” which might be done by this summer, cross my fingers and hope . . .
Sarah and I made our way down to Capitol Lake and did the circuit twice. Mothers and strollers, lovers and business acquaintances, dog-walkers and shuffling retirees kept us company as we found our rhythm. She’s a good running partner, comfortable with not talking, at peace in her own mind. I suspect she uses running as therapy, like I do, pushing memories of sexual abuse aside, allowing good vibes to enter, endorphins working their magic on her bruised and battered psyche. I found her on a similar run, six months earlier, being beaten by her pimp. I offered her a way out of the nightmare she was trapped in. She reluctantly took that offer, learned to trust Liz and I, and soon became part of our family. Her pimp did not survive that encounter, a sad statistic in a sad business.
Her auburn hair hung damp on her shoulders as we slowed to a walk at the end of five miles. She was two weeks shy of twenty-one, but she had seen two full lifetimes of ugliness in that short span of time. Her parents had died when she was fifteen. The foster system dropped her into the lap of depravity. She ran away from that and entered a life of hooking at sixteen. I found her, offered her a hand up, and she is now an irreplaceable member of our family.
It’s one thing to read about depravity in a police report. In that form it is antiseptic and white-washed. It is quite another to actually see the dark shroud of depravity fall over a victim and forever stain them. Sarah survived her brush with the chimera. There are thousands who do not. The billion dollar business of trafficking thrives because of supply and demand, and ethics be damned in a society which likes to believe it is advanced. Your next-door neighbor Sam, your boys’ Little League coach, may very well be paying one-hundred per month on adult porn films starring twelve-year old girls snatched from the streets of Topeka and held against their will with veins flowing GHB. Your pastor may very well visit the House of the Rising Sun after his sermons, and his bed partners aren’t old enough to have a driver’s license. This shit is happening and it is happening in your little corner of the world despite your denials.
Where does the darkness come from, Bill, I asked myself in a moment of self-reflection, but I had no answer other than the fact that I am an observer of life. Everyone is shocked by the Jeffrey Eptstein story and the Harvey Weinstein story and the Bill Cosby story, but are they really shocked? Can you really say that it all surprises you? Child porn has been around for hundreds of years. People have made fortunes filming snuff films, for God’s sake. The human species has a dark side, end of story. Always has and always will! You can’t pretend the Boogie Man away. You can’t hide under the covers in a gated community and hope the ugliness disappears.
And so I write about it, in hopes of raising awareness about it, in hopes of somehow bringing about change for the better. It should never be acceptable for children to be exploited. Never!
So sayeth one writer in Olympia, Washington!
COACHING
I’ve still got two spots open for coaching. I make this statement with complete confidence: I can make you a better writer! Drop me an email at holland1145@yahoo.com and let’s get started.
Bill
“Helping writers to spread their wings and fly.”
Billybuc
Artistry With Words 