Make-Believe

There was one 7-year-old boy, at the beginning of the school year we didn’t have a spot for him yet. He used to show up after his older sister, riding in on a BMX bike. And I’m thinking, this is not a safe neighborhood for a boy of his age to be riding around on his own. But he would do that for a while and we’d have to take him back home, because he wasn’t in the program. That was very telling that his mom thought it was okay that he ride around in this neighborhood, when I wouldn’t walk through here alone.

Eventually we found a spot for him in the program. But he was hanging out with older kids for a while, bad influences, 14-year-old truants who were up to no good. Needless to say this boy was hardened to a level that no 7-year-old should be.

Then one day, he’d been in the program for maybe a month, and we took the kids to Universal Studios for a field trip. We went on the Mummy ride, where you’re going through these dark tunnels, and all of a sudden this boy is terrified out of his mind, scared of the things coming out of the walls, crying, wanting to get off the ride. And while it’s never fun to see a crying child, to see him so scared over something so silly was kind of great… because finally he could be a little boy again.

No harsh reality, no BMX rides through bad neighborhoods. Just make-believe.

CV JH