My heart is sooo very sad ... ( Archived) (30)

HzChld: I am the Mom with the house who has the teen age daughter where all her friends, and her friends friends, like to hang out...Kinda like the "block Mom". I take this as a huge compliment. There are some kids that come over even when my daughter is not home and we just sit and talk about "stuff"... It is just a known fact that if any are hungry, need a place to go, etc., my door is always open...as well as the kitchen!

I get attached to these teen age kids and consider them partly my own. Funny thing is...they all call me "Mom". I take this as another great compliment. Last week a terrible thing happened and it has left me heartbroken and soooo very sad. One of the young men, 18 yrs. old, was stabbed by another...his cousin actually...and he was killed. He was stabbed twice in the heart and died on his cousin's lawn. Yes, the cousin frequented my house also. They were together alot. I am honestly very sad for both young men. In actuality, two lives were lost...not just one. The cousin is 17 and I am almost certain he will be tried as an adult, instead of a juvenile. They were just here Friday night, along with lots of the other kids that hang out here. Saturday afternoon my young friend was gone forever. He always helped my daughter with her Geometry and he always made sure she was safe when she was out at the high school games, etc. She is a cheerleader.

Some of his family had mentioned they were concerned that he might not look like himself for the funeral services. Sometimes the mortuary people do not always do the best of jobs just because they do not really always know how the deceased looked when alive. Soooo I offered to go and help make sure he looked as much like himself as possible. In all honesty, the mortuary people did an awful job! I tried to fix the color of his face as close as possible to his true skin color. I smoothed his eyebrows, put just a tad of pink on his lips, made sure his hair was like he liked it to always look, straightened the knot of his tie, told him I loved him and missed him...then kissed him on the forehead. I am sure some of you may find this quite odd, I know I do, but I heard myself telling him...asking him to get the hell up. He had his whole future in front of him...laid out beautifully. He would have graduated high school this May and then off to college to become a petroleum engineer...something he had always dreamed of becoming.

It has now been a week and I seem to be having a very difficult time with sad. I just cannot seem to shake it off...his parents are devastated. As are the parents of his cousin who did the stabbing. I had to do my best to try to explain to my daughter, and some of the other kids, that they could not let themselves hate the cousin. His actions are not to be condoned, because they were wrong....very very wrong There is no excuse for what he did. I had to try to explain that hartred will eat you up inside...make you very old and very ugly before your time. It was a hard lesson to try to teach them.

Forgiveness is a Choice....it sure as hell is not a feeling. We will all miss him soooo very much...we already do miss him very much. In the blink of an eye...two young, beautiful kids lost their lives. What a waste...what a senseless waste. My apologies for the long read...Guess I just needed to write this out in a "safe place". I will attempt to put a pic up of my young friend/son on my profile...not sure if the site will allow it or not. Anyway...thanks for the time it took to read this...I know its long.
Rest well my young friend...my son...our beloved Manuel. We will see you again. We love and miss you.