Chapter Twenty Seven
I've Got To
Do Something
Why did I survive? Why am I alive? For so long, I struggled to go on amidst the pain and the abandonment and the fear. But I made it. Why? I'm glad I did, but what good was all the pain if all I did was survive? I want to do more than survive. There has to be more.
Maybe I started to know at 17 when I met Johnny, who was 13. Trust came slowly, and so did the story about his Boy Scout leader molesting him. I've never forgotten that shy, fragile hurting boy. I never will.
Only in the last seven years did I understand. I've walked through crowds and gatherings and youth groups and congregations for years, and I sensed them there, the 1 in 6, I saw flashes of painfilled eyes, longing to reach another but bound by crippling fear.
Then came the children, injured children with no visible scars but a hollow echo of a child's laughter like a ghost in their hearts followed by a scream of desperation no one could hear.
Then I knew, I had to do something. No matter what the cost. No matter what people thought.
I longed for years for a Voice of my own kind to speak, to say, "You're not alone, I've been there too", but no one came, so I knew I'd have to be a voice for others. I saw myself in each one, felt their sorrow and held their trust as sacred. I always will. They are the bravest company I know.
So I'll keep speaking because there are more. I had to do something. Because God wastes nothing, not even our loneliest sorrows and worst devastations.
Wouldn't you have to do something, too?
