Batteries

One of the best parts of being with kids all day is that the simplest task can make you a hero. Tying a shoe. Retrieving toilet paper, and especially replacing dead batteries. You would think that batteries were like diamonds in their coveted-ness in our house.

Batteries make everything better;

toy not working as well as it used to? New batteries!

Voice box on a toy gone out? New batteries!

Cranky and exhausted nanny? New batteries! (ha! I wish)

How many things in our lives do we view as "new batteries" a quick change and then it'll be good again. Back to what we experienced when things were new and shiney and yet to let us down. I know I'm guilty of that quite a lot. Maybe this apology will be it. Maybe this time so and so will stop being a total jack hole and treat me the way I deserve. Maybe I won't be blamed for everything anymore and I'll for once be happy with myself. Its a long road to realize that there is never a quick fix.

Things don't get better over night and there is no such thing as "New batteries!" in life. I wish there was. Sometimes I wish I could just take a screw driver and after multiple failed attempts (because lets be honest, I have no idea how to use a screw driver.) get the back open to realize "HEY! This boy just has a dead battery. Turns out he does know how to play nice!" Turns out some are just rotten to the core. Some just don't have a good bone in their body. Same goes for girls. Some are mean. Some don't have your best interest at heart and no matter how many times they make you cry it'll never get better.

That being said, there's no reason to fret. Just as not everyone is good, not everyone is bad either. Heck, I'm out there, being nice, going the extra mile, smiling. There's got to be more like me right? People who see others who are hurting and want to make it better. Want to fix it.

Thats my problem. I want so badly to replace batteries for people. I want to swoop in, unscrew that back, replace the thing that is broken and send them on their way. Smiling. Knowing that someone is happier because of something I could do for them.

I think thats where I get hung up on Preston. I put in so much effort. Forgave so much, hoping that someday I'd see him happy and know that maybe I was a part of that. That I had replaced his dead battery. But I couldn't. I didn't have the right size. I was all out. And just like replacing a dead battery is the best feeling in my job, one of the worst is having to unscrew that back, open it up, and realize you don't have the right size, only to screw it back up still not working and try to explain to that crest fallen 2 year old face and say "Sorry buddy. I can't do it."

So to those in my life I couldn't fix, because thats just not how life works....

Sorry buddy. I can't do it.