Hold 'em Down

For many years I had a business in the Midwest and one of my most lasting memories, is also kind of a strange one. On Fridays we stayed open late. One of our customers was a farm couple. They came in many Friday nights, but they seldom bought anything. I felt that they were a very lonely middle-aged couple and they often came in to have someone to talk to.
The reason they stick in my memory is the way he first addressed his wife. He only called her DUMMY! He would find something that he wanted to share with her, and then shoot her down with his comment. It made no difference to him if the store was full of people or they were the only people in the store. Any time he would find something that he was interested in, always in a loud voice he would say “come here Dummy and look at this!”
After about the third Friday night of that, I invited them into the store’s back room. I told him it hurt me every time he called her that name in my store. Then she uttered the only words I ever heard from her mouth. She looked up at me and said that she was not sure if he could even remember her name! He then took her by the arm and stormed out of the store!
A few weeks later they were back! He and his voiceless wife, the one he now called by name, came back many Fridays until we closed the store.
Many religions tell the man that he is “the head of the household!” the dominant male, almost inferring that the woman should walk three steps behind! Why would any religion feel that one child of God is better than another child of God? Aren’t they really encouraging the man “to hold em down?” Aren’t they really telling one sex to have less faith in themselves than the other?
In our world of today, where it is politically correct to make fun or run-down others, isn’t the real goal to hold em down? If our God had wanted us to be goldfish in a bowl, that would have been how he would have created us!
As I have said before; My Friend is always looking over my shoulder when I’m working on these blogs. Several days after I thought I had this one finished, I was told to go back and reread this one! I was told I had more that I should say!
He reminded me of a previous blog on bullying. He asks if I could not see the relation between that entry and this one. Yes, I sure can now! Isn’t “holding em down” nothing more than bullying? And, He told me that it was bullying of the worst kind! Think of how many times that we have read of people taking their own lives because of someone’s bullying! Others taking away their faith in themselves!
Sadly, often it’s friends, family, loved ones, or even their religious leaders causing this to happen! You would not believe, that in my conversation with others, the first thing I’m told is; they wish they were dead or that they have nothing left to live for! I’ve spent hundreds of hours talking with people that feel all hope is lost! That they have lost faith in themselves and some even in their God!
There is no jail time for those thieves, the ones that take away the only real thing that some people have left!
This past week I had a lady tell me that God had given her so little to work with. God gives each of us everything we need to live our lives! It’s up to us to learn to use what we have been given!
My Grandma was the guiding factor in my life. She continually told me things like; “Bob, we both know that you are better than that”, or “Bob, we both know you can do better than that.” Many times she would point to others as an example before I would hear those words. She and Grandpa never had much money, actually they were poor, but they were the richest people that ever touched my life!
Looking back today; I realize the ones that worked the hardest to hold me down, were really the ones that caused me to set my goals higher!