Innocence

If you were to ask my parents what kind of child I was they would undoubtedly boast that I was a sweet child. I never got in trouble. Okay I can remember being spanked twice and to this day I still blame both of those on my brother. He accused me of giving him the middle finger (which I did) but I didn't know what it meant (honestly, I was THAT innocent). When my mom asked me if I gave Donny the finger I said I didn't and I really wasn't lying - I had no idea what she was talking about. Well, I got sent to my room all afternoon to think about my behavior and wait for dad to get home (we all know what that means). I clearly remember sitting in my room the entire afternoon thinking "when dad comes home and gives me my spank I am NOT going to cry, I've done nothing wrong. They are so unfair! I haven't lied - I don't know what they are talking about. I hate Donny." Donny, if you are reading this you know how much I love you! Like clockwork around 6pm came the dreaded thump thump of dad's work boots on the porch and then the hushed whispering in the kitchen. After dad gave me the "spank" I remember him turning me around and I stood there glaring at him, holding hot tears back and refusing to cry. In one blink of an eye I heard him shout "are you defying me? get over my knee!" Ha! I can promise you, on that second spank I ever got? I cried!

The big thing that sticks out in my head when I think about that story is that I was an innocent girl. I'm not talking about the average innocence of your average child. I mean all the other kids knew what the middle finger meant, yet I did not. Why was that? Probably because when I was a little girl I was more concerned with playing dolls, dress-up, Little House on the Prairie and practicing to be a mommy one day. Anne of Green Gables was my hero and Road to Avonlea was my favorite show. My innocence was in part due to the upbringing I had but it can't be blamed entirely on that. In my heart I've always been tender, never concerned with ugly things and always clinging to the romantic idea of "happily ever after." Yes, I was such an innocent child - too innocent perhaps but if I had to go back I wouldn't change that. I'm proud of that.

Looking back on my late teens and early twenties I see so clearly how my young, girlish innocence was reflected in so many of my experiences.  It was almost as though I couldn't believe that people could truly be as selfish and uncaring as they were (at least the ones I had the "privilege" to know).  That people use each other in the way they do.  I knew what was in my heart and I wanted to believe that must be in their's too.  I was always trying to believe that it was better than it really was.  And I think that is why I continued in some of the unhealthy relationships I did.  I'm not using innocence as an excuse.  I wish I would have grown up faster, tuned into truth quicker.  I was looking for love in all the wrong places.  Big surprise I didn't find it!

Now, nearly a decade later, I'm no fool.  I've been around the block, so to speak.  I don't live in a fantasy land or lie to myself about what's potentially really happening.  But it doesn't change that in my heart I'm still that  young, innocent girl.  A girl who wants to love and to be loved.  To be accepted and adored, what woman would say that they didn't want that?  What man?  Humans. We all want to belong.  The difference for me now is that I won't settle.  I don't want a fleeting love.  I want that complete, consuming love that lasts a lifetime.  If I only find it when I'm eighty it will have been worth the wait.  It won't be perfect, because nothing is.  But it will be perfect enough for me.