Screw up or over?

Uggh, I had a thought today and I was like ooh that would be such a good thing to blog about.  But now I totally can't think of what it was.  I know that I as standing in the kitchen this morning before work.  I was blanching massive amounts of swiss chard and kale so that I could freeze them.  And I was like hmm I should write that down, but then I didn't because I was like no I won't forget that, it's such a great thought.  Apparently not.  Because I did forget it.  And now I'm just writing about nothingness while I'll try and remember what it was that I was thinking about.

Well I can't remember, so instead let's talk about this quote that someone said at this meeting that I was at today (this is a paraphrase of course): "These kids are not bad seeds.  They are not on the street because they are screw ups, but because they have been screwed over by their families and by society as a whole."

Do you understand this?  Really understand it?

If I were to say 'homeless youth' what would you picture?  A kid who dropped out of school? ran away from a good family? is violent? has an alcohol and/or drug problem? is a trouble maker? steals? has problems with the police? is involved with gangs? etc. etc?  Although some of these things may be true for some of the youth that are living on the streets, in most cases none of these things are the reason why they are on the street.  They may have been abused, neglected, kicked out, etc by their family for various reasons.  Not to mention all of the institutionalized racism, classism, sexism, heterosexism, etc from society (especially their schools) that they have had to face.

I can tell you first hand that these kids are not screw ups.  They are smarter than a lot of kids I know that are their age.  They are more resilient, creative, resourceful, courageous, and strong than most people I know.  And they all have the most interesting/amazing personalities.  Like really they are some of the least boring people that I have met in my entire life.  For real.  They are super fun to be around.  I could tell you tons of stories about how these kids are like the OPPOSITE of screw ups.

I could go on forever about this stuff.  These situations could have happened to us if we were born into a different family in a different place or time.  I'm just saying.  Don't write these kids off as bad seeds.  They are often great seeds that have been really screwed over.  What happened to them and where they came from has nothing to do with who they are and what they have done.  These are great people.