Jealousy is a useless emotion in human beings....

Joshua Bebow.

I write that name because he a week ago he was a seventeen year old boy going to high school in the town I grew up in.

This week he is in heaven with his savior.

 

I'm told Josh was an amazing kid- smart and popular, blessed from most people's point of view. He had three brothers, his mother and father and a large extended, close-knit family. He was active in school and was a member of a Catholic church in my home town.

Or at least that is what I gathered from what people have told me.

 

A tragic car accident took his life.

 

I personally didn't know Josh. I knew his father because we went to the same high school. We were not friends. But my heart aches for such a loss. Not only because we are both parents but because- I love teenaged children. And my heart breaks for the loss of even one of them.

I cried the other day, over the phone while talking to my mother, about a child I have never met and never would until we are both in heaven.

 

It wasn't the first time.

 

I don't know what it is about teenagers that I enjoy….If it's the whimsy in their step or the completely open minded thoughtfulness of their being….Or if it's the lyrical poetic beauty of a mind at that age? There is something about teenagers that I enjoy being around.

Maybe it's because they are adults with open minds? They have not, for the most part, had the tragedy of life befall them yet and can be blissfully optimistic.

 

This one however, is gone.

And so much more is the loss for the rest of the world.

 

All we can think is that he was such a good person, and such a joy here on Earth, that God in his infinite wisdom, took him so that he could be a shining soul in heaven and amuse The Lord himself.

 

At least I hope that eventually his parents can come to believe that.

 

 

When you are growing up, you think to yourself that you are the only person in the world with the certain problems. Sometimes you wish that you could trade places with someone else, but you don't know what tragedy is in their lives. You don't know what tragedy will be in their lives.

 

When you have a child with Autism, the child that was born to you, dies in your mind. They will never be on the football team, they won't go to the prom or drive a car or be their brother or sisters confidant. And you grieve for them as if they had died. Even though you still have this other child that has taken their place.

Does that sound harsh?

You give birth to someone with perceptions of what they will become. When it is ripped away from you and you know it; it's a death.

 

I remember the first time I had to tell someone that Booga was mentally disabled. I sobbed for hours. It was admitting something I didn't want to believe was true. How could God, who had made me so socially awkward, verbally inept; how could I have been so lucky as to score a disabled child to boot? I remember being in high school and thinking, "If I could only be someone else, somewhere else…." And looking for a way to be someone else, somewhere else….

I was constantly making up some kind of story or some kind of role for me to play in my mind to just get me through the day… And if you came into my circle; you were walking into a role in my private movie of the day.

And I was Jealous of people who just seemed to waft through life. Who just seemed to have everything handed to them…They were beautiful and popular and brilliant and I had to work for everything.

But you know, what I didn't realize (being a teenager and therefore somewhat self-absorbed as they tend to be) was that the people passing me in the hallways had their own demons and flaws to overcome- or would have flaws and demons to overcome. Like, one girl; might be a cheerleader but she has a craptacular home life and would love to have a mother like mine. And one of the guys that seems to have it all going on; however, he's also going to have repeating bouts of cancer when he becomes an adult and not live long enough to see his kids grow up.

The guy that seems to have nothing but a good time on his plate is going to be an alcoholic and a drug abuser.

This other person is going to end up selling drugs.

And this guy; yeah, he's captain of the football team, but his dad is going to commit suicide shortly after he graduates from high school.

 

Jealousy is a useless emotion in human beings really.

My friend's, jealousy in human beings IS USE-LESS.

 

People are going to be jealous of you no matter what and people are going to treat you poorly sometimes because of reasons that seem insane and really no fault of your own.

 

I know in my life, when I was young, I was jealous of my cousin's material possessions and the fact that they were dark, and beautiful. However, I realize now that it was not always the best atmosphere in their home and that they were probably jealous of the fact that I had both parents in my home and none of the stresses of their family.

I know that there were people in school with me that were jealous of me because of my father's position in town and because of my last name growing up…..And really, trust me, when you are growing up with a prominent name in a small town, sometimes it's not the coolest thing in the world. Sometimes you would just like to be ambiguous. I know that even some were jealous of my red hair and the fair skin….Which completely perplexes me.

I know of someone when I was in high school that went out of her way to bad talk me to other people, who in turn hated me for no good reason. She was jealous of my position in my own family, she was jealous of the love that my parents showed me and even jealous of my siblings and the people in their families. It was ludicrous.

There was absolutely nothing I could do to change who I was and who my parents were and who my siblings married or for that matter, who their children were…Your position in life is what God gives you. There was absolutely nothing I could have done to change who I was because I was a child. And to be honest I wouldn't have even if I could have because this was my family, not theirs.

And because of other peoples influence and my grandmother and mother (who, in perpetuity, I will see in my minds eye as wringing their hands and putting their palms to their cheeks in concern) I became a nervous and paranoid person who can't stand the winter darkness…(So why am I in the mid-west with all it's winter darkness?)

Good news is that since high school, things have straightened out in my world and I and this person who was jealous of me have become okay with each other. I still can't grasp her jealousy, however, I am glad that I was not the only one whom she was jealous of and that other people were also the brunt of her self-loathing wrath.

And that is really what jealousy is isn't it-self-loathing and anger at your life not being what you want it to be in your own opinion? And envy….Envy at someone having something that you so desperately want and think will make your life okay?

And isn't meanness and jealousy and envy and self-loathing, all tied in together? Isn't there always something in there that makes a mean-spirited person the way they are….The fact that they didn't accomplish some goal in their lives or become the person that they thought that they would always become…Or have the family that they wanted or the career that they wanted, or was the highlight of someone's life or made someone happy whose opinion meant the world to them?

 

I began thinking about this while I was watching television one day and listening to people complaining about someone simply because they were jealous of them; and I say this because clearly it was jealousy and nothing to do with anything this person had done to them individually or to the world as a whole, their lives were just junk right now and they were digging on them because they were one those people who just seemed to have everything and they were vulnerable right now.

 

Like vultures, they were picking at them while they were down, simply because they could. This person just happened to have the extraordinary opportunity to be extremely blessed. And it was then that it occurred to me that jealousy is a largely useless emotion in human beings and causes some of the most astounding pain and grief in the world.

 

I'm sure there are reasons human beings are gifted with jealousy. But as human beings we can't control our jealous rage and therefore should try to alienate this need to be jealous of people, simply for the things they never asked for but were gifted with anyway. They were just blessed with different gifts than you- not better ones, just different ones.

 

Do not covet.

It's one of God's commandments.

 

The grass is always greener on the other side…However; they fail to tell you when you get there that the taxes are also higher.

 

You never know what the other persons life is going to be like and there are going to be things in their lives that are not going to be pleasant, even though you may not see them from the outside.

 

I am blessed.

 

Booga is verbal and not wheel chair bound. He is relatively healthy, however annoying at times. My husband loves me desperately and I strive to keep him happy and myself worthy of that love. My average children are smart and content, for the time being, and they love me and they are good people and grow spiritually in The Lord from time to time so I know I wasn't talking to the wall all the time while raising them.

They live far away; however, I do see them during the year. My husband's job affords us a comfortable living and it makes that possible…..And The Lord's blessings are always apparent in my life. Even though it might seem to the outsider that they are not….They very much are….And I thank you Lord Almighty Creator of Heaven and Earth for all the blessings you have bestowed on us.

 

I am blessed.

 

And I am jealous of no one…. any longer…..