And A Child Shall Lead Them!!!

He was reminiscing about the the times when he was a kid. Things seemed clearer then. Everyone's role was pretty clear. The father went to work and provided the money and was the boss of the family or so the mother made him think so. The mother stayed home and cleaned the house, raised the kids, cooked the meals and was the REAL boss of the house, sort of the power behind the throne. The children were to be seen and not heard which drove them outside the house for their little world which really wasn't "little" after all. The dress for the boys even signified their place in the world around them. Up to six or seven short pants was the order of the day, from 8 till 12 knickers which golfers like to call plus fours after Confirmation long pants. You knew your place if you were a male child just by the length of  your pants.

He had fallen arches which caused him to wear high shoes that gave support to his ankles but combined with his baby fat and inability to run really fast made him slow as a turtle.  This led to many confrontations at least a few fights a week. At first he was the winner but after a talking to by the Principal of his elementary school and a good beating by his mom and the fact he was getting fatter not stronger he started to lose more than he won. He remembered the thing that saved him was he was a good softball player, could hit a ton and he had bats, gloves and saved softballs after they lost their cover by taping them over with black rubber tape so they could last forever until they went down a sewer or became soft as a marshmallow Then about long pants time he got a bike started exercising and growing soon he was winning the fights again. He was getting real good at chasing down fly balls and he was taller than most of his peers. He even was able to climb the rope in Gym at his High School.

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He loved his bike, a Schwinn. He rode it all over. It was the equivalent of his car. Got him away from the neighborhood so he could sneak a smoke. Got him down to the parks for try-outs for the local baseball teams. The one bad thing was his mom made him go to the local Italian grocery store for milk, bread, ham and all the fill in stuff that was needed. In those days there wasn't any real super markets and the local grocery store was a daily drop in. With the advent of super markets came shopping for the week. In those days there was Joe's grocery, Franks vegetable and fruit store and the butcher. The ice box was replaced by the refrigerator but there wasn't a freezer so you had to use what you purchased fairly soon or else it would go bad and who could afford to throw out food. Money was really tight in those days.

.Things change, maybe for the better. But life was simpler then. He thought today everything is more complicated. One thing is sure though, we really don't have "places" in life. Women have just as much right to everything that men have rights to. Children shouldn't just be seen and not heard. Children have the right to be happy in this world and the problems they encounter are just as real and debilitating to them as the problems adults have.

Malala Yousafzai, a 17 year old Pakistani girl became the youngest to ever win the Nobel Peace Prize. When she was 16 she was almost killed by being shot in the head by a Taliban. All she did was be a girl, a girl who wanted education. She was female and they felt her place was to be married at a young age have children and take care of home and husband. She had no rights as she was female, a child and didn't need an education. Well she miraculously survived and is leading a crusade for children all over the world to get an education because knowledge frees us, it allows all of us to become the person we were meant to be.
We all have a place in this world and that place is to be all we can be, some might say all that our Creator meant us to be. This young lady can be the focal point to help women and children all over God's green earth to be free and realize the potential that is in all of us. He thought, "There is going to be a brave new world as long as we have people like Malala. We grown-ups haven't the courage, or desire she has shown. So to get to this brave new world I guess the old Biblical verse is true; 'A child shall lead them!'".