"Rooollin' down the street, smokin' eeendo..."

...sippin' on FOR-MU-LA--laaaaid back! ...okay, i sung that merely to get your attention. Expect NOT to laugh from this point on. The following video is a little hard to stomach.



I thought twice about posting this video and what I'm about to share... after all, it is very personal to me. But after seeing what I saw in this video clip, my physical experience of an accelerated heart rate, feelings of repressed anger surfacing, and the urge to scream, convinced me that it was too important NOT to share.

Now, some of you may already know this, but for those of you that don't, lemme tell you a little bit about mwah. I'm a girl who came from a semi-hard knocks
neighborhood. Hawaiian boondocks + Low socioeconomic status = perfect breeding ground for drug selling, making, and using...and pretty much everything else that you can think of that could happen in such an environment...did. And that is NOT an exaggeration.

To better illustrate, allow me to introduce "Big Daddy." "Big Daddy" was my best friend's step father...famous for his drunken slur and alcohol-soaked mustache.

I remember having a terrible cough one night that I slept over (probably from the smoke-box of a house they lived in) so I asked my best friend for cough medicine. While in the kitchen, I threw back the dose she gave me, hoping to avoid most of the sting on my raw throat. "Big Daddy" sat and observed. I winced. A roar of intoxicated laughter came from "Big Daddy"...

BD: "Hun! (speaking to his wife) Did you see that?! jeeessiiiica cannot even handle Rooobitussin! BAAAAAHHHHAAAHAAAAAHAAA! (referring to the amount of alcohol in Robitussin).

...laughter continues...and continues....

Being 11, I HAD to attempt a justification for my wincing... which only led to more ridicule. I learned quickly to never reason with a drunk.

And that's just a TASTE of "Big Daddy." Luckily, I was not the one who bore the brunt of this man's abusive behavior...my best friend, who was the oldest of 4, did. For the sake of time, I will sum up, what could very well fill up an entire book, with just a few memories I have (prepare yourselves):

-best friend missing school because "BD" put a hole in her head with a bamboo stick
(He literally chased her and broke down a door to beat her head to a bloody pulp).

-best friend and I (both 12 at the time) standing in her kitchen while "BD", in his slur, teased best friend..."You're a slut... you F*** all da boyz... so n' so told me...you F*** all da boyz in dis neighborhood...jessica...you wanna be friends with a slut?"

-me watching tears run down best friend's otherwise emotionless face while she stared "BD" down during his tirade

-secretly feeding best friend breakfasts outside my b-room window as she stayed in the abandoned house down the block after running away from home (which was up the other block)

I'll stop there. ...... Even now, it is heart-wrenching for me to recall what my best friend had to endure all those years. The very environment that was supposed to love, nurture, and sustain her instead robbed her of any sense of self-worth, replacing it with painful lies, and desensitized her from basic good and bad. I could go on and on.

Mind you, these are just some experiences of only ONE of my friends, and true, it was much more than what happened in the video, but my point is... if families can't protect their own, WHO WILL?? And these types of circumstances are more common than some might think... happening in all parts of our nation, in many homes, to many children. Including most of the homes in my neighborhood in hawaii that housed all of my friends. And while it is disturbing to think about, having an heightened awareness will hopefully instill more resolve within us to make our own homes safer places for our children, and to watch out for those children who need our help when they are in serious danger.

Again, my intent in posting this was to inform and express, not to exploit. Deep-rooted empathy for many of my childhood friends has driven me to learn about and understand the true antecedents of problematic behavior... and not just the symptoms. I strongly believe that the family environment helps make or break a child. And although I am not able to heal my friends' families...I pray that I can one day make a difference in other families. Even if just one.

**Disclaimer: Although my shared experience took place in Hawaii, that does not mean the people in my experience were of Polynesian background. "Big Daddy" was a Caucasian man.