Ted Williams

I have waited to comment on the phenomenon of Ted Williams as reality got sorted out from the teeter-totter of sudden success.  Mr. Williams is now enrolled in a substance abuse treatment program because he used.  I listened to many people in the street comment and shake their head about what had happened.  I listened to many in the shelter and their response was "I hope he will be Ok..." I listened and said little about it until now.

Mr. Williams suffered for years out on the streets, a terrible life under the best of circumstances.  No one asks to be Homeless, not FOR REAL Homelessness (some kids do like to 'experience' the Hobo lifestyle...toddling down the road leading a care free life isn't quite the same as the pain and humiliation of having no place to call home)  So when the sun shone on his predicament...we all shared a little hope in that.  It's like someone at your job winning the LOTTO or someone finding true love … someone who has been single longer than you...it gives hope.

And that is what I still feel about Ted Williams and pray to impart to every Homeless person that I meet... I’m sorry, to Everyone I meet.

And I don't want this to come across like some Televangelist spouting some awful success doctrine "Keep on pressing on and someday someone will snatch you out of your situation and set you on the mountain top like TED WILLIAMS!"  I trust God for everything and still know that sometimes, there are reasons that we are down...sometimes reasons way beyond our abilities to change them (see my earlier post on Ability vs. Capability).

But Homelessness does not define us and hope should be IN us, not created by our circumstances.  Should a person hold on to hope when it looks like (to everyone else’s eyes) that there is no hope to hold on to?  Yes and HOLD ON.  Hope is more than this thing or that thing, larger than anything you can touch or stake a claim to in the natural...it is birthed into your spirit.  Not as naive as rose-colored-glasses but it does change your outlook.  Mr. Williams inspired us for what happened to him, but the fresh clean air of hope that we breathed into our starving lungs didn't get rudely exhaled (well, not from all of us) when things went south for Mr. Williams.  For various reasons, some of us just refused to exhale. 

And I would advise that to you as well, dear reader, when ever you can, whenever anyone achieves something that inspires you...Hold that breath!  Because your circumstances might flip on you or you may be torn by this life...or maybe you just get tired of trying so hard for so long.  That held-onto hope might just sustain you until you recover.

God bless you Mr. Williams, get better and get better at getting better...and, please, never let go of your Hope!

Poem "The Question Mark of Cain"

“The Question Mark of Cain”

I’m not exactly sure how this works

Grieving I've  Grieved You

Last time I looked it was me that lost

But it seems my loss

Has inconvenienced you

I am bewildered by how this is

Hating myself you hate me

My face, my body, my breath is abhorrent

You detest my stink

My being & the thought of me

I’m unsure of how again to be sure

And in my confusion you are certain

That I and everything that has to do with me

Isn’t worth a moment

An inkling

The fleck of paint on the caboose

Of the thought train in your mind

And victimized

I feel I should apologize

© 2010  S.LaDon Ware