A Walkabout

In the Australian culture, aborigines take the males on a "walkabout" as they enter adolescence.  This walkabout is a spiritual journey that is the passage from being a boy to becoming a man.

Today, Franklin begins his journey to the wilderness to "walkabout with the button."

No, we have not spoken to "the button."  We do get letters on a weekly basis but we do not speak with him.

While the "button" has been walking in the wilderness, living off the land, carving feeding utensils and talking, we have been doing the same.  We just have air conditioning.


Our journey has been via the phone with therapists and parents from all over the United States.  Again, if you take your troubles and put them in a bag and go to market, I am now 100% sure, you would leave with your original bag.  Oh, the stories and the broken hearts and spirits during group therapy. 

During this past year, if I had a nickle for every person who has said, "if you could just get him out of here."  Well, I am here to tell you that every state in the union is represented there.  It only matters who you are and not where you are.

People have written or called and asked me questions about this program.
Why did we chose it?  It spoke to me.  It is truly that simple.  I researched and researched and researched and this program spoke to me.  The questionnaire made my head spin and even though over a million people have googled it, I really felt like that page was speaking to little old me.

And, this program is about EVERYONE at our address.  For the first time, the first question was not, "what type of insurance do you have and how are you going to pay for this.?" 

It was organic and about the entire family and all of us have participated.

What have I learned?  Very simple, a heart at peace is much more productive than a heart at war.  That statement is so very easy to write but so challenging to get there.  One year ago when the storm began, we all had hearts at war.  All the wars were different, but they were there.  I had a storm, Franklin, Walker, Addie and the "button" all had hearts at war.  All different, but there. 

Once I saw a three minute segment on the Oprah show.  I don't know who said it but what they said was so meaningful to me, "the more energy you give something, positive or negative, the bigger it becomes."  When your heart is at war, nothing very positive will come. 

This program has changed our hearts, our outlooks and our goals.  It has also changed our "being".  We listen more, we talk more and we speak to one another like we are real people and not objects.  Trust me, Franklin is getting a T-shirt that says, "not an object" on it.  As you go through life, day to day life, it is so very easy to sometimes bark out orders, answer shortly or curtly and not listen.  It is easy and we are ALL guilty of it.  We have spent hours changing our hearts here under the air conditioned roof while the "button" has practiced this, and many more things under moonlight skies.

Is the "button" fixed?  I hate that question.  Hate it and struggle immensely when asked.  My son is a child.  He is not broken.  He just needed help.  Like glasses.  We got him some glasses that look into his heart and his mind.

Am I hopeful?  Of course I am.  And, I am at peace.  A year ago, I didn't leave my house.   I was a mess.  Not today.  I am at peace.

I am excited for the men in my life.  I wish I was with them.  I am certainly there in spirit.  And they are in my heart. And this heart is a peaceful heart.