When Love isn't Enough

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
  They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
  And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
  By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
  And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
  It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
  And don't have any kids yourself.     (Philip Larkin, This Be the Verse)

It was one of those days today at work.

I was part of a process that was lengthy, frustrating, annnoying, sad, and at times, seemingly pointless. I was involved in a meeting with three teenage girls.

That premise enough was sufficient to bring on a mini migraine. Teenagers are annoying at the best of times. But these three challenged me, made me angry, garnered my sympathy and ultimately, left me feeling so sad about how some young people are treated in our so called developed and progressive society.

As this is a work related diatribe, I need to be mindful of confidentiality of individuals and proceedings. So I will keep it as general as I can.

All the girls were charged with an offence. Not major stuff, basically wrong place, wrong time scenarios. Each girl presented as defiant, argumentative, resentful and non cooperative at various stages of the meeting. At one stage, I actually wanted to scream. I wanted to shout at them and tell them to smarten up, get their acts together. But I didn't. Instead, I started to look at who they brought with them to the meeting.

Two girls brought their mothers. The way they spoke to their mothers was, putting it bluntly, disgusting. Neither girl actually looked at her mother unless she absolutely had to. They swore at their mothers and repeatedly told them to shut up. And the mothers looked at me, as if to say, "See what I endure" and took it. They allowed their daughters to disrespect them in front of me, a stranger. This made me look closer.

As the meeting wore on (ultimately going for three longgggggg hours), some of the greater truths emerged. The girl who has not lived at home for nearly a year, despite only just being a teenager. Her mother freely admits she does not know where her daughter lives or where she is at any time. When she talks about her daughter, she refers to her as "she" or "her". It's like she can't bring herself to say her daughter's name. He daughter looks at her with undisguised hatred and contempt. Her mother can barely look at her.

The mother who says the "right things" at first, who appears to have tried everything. Maybe she has. But as the meeting wears on, her frustration becomes more evident. She starts to say things, seemingly designed specifically to elicit a negative response from her daughter. After one particularly ludicrous suggestion, which reduces her daughter to frustrated tears, swearing and leaving the room, she smirks. And continues to smirk for the rest of the meeting. It's like she is saying, "See? See what I have to put up with?" I want to tell her that I see. I see what her daughter has to deal with. And I see why her daughter would prefer not to be at home.

And the mouthy one. The girl who came in oozing bad attitude, who spoke when she wasn't spoken to, who radiated a "F$&@ you" attitude to all in the room. Damn, I disliked her intensely for the first hour. And then, she started to cry. When she should have been shouting and swearing. When it all got too hard, she cried. Because she's a kid. And that's what they do. They cry, and they want someone to help them, to care about them, to tell them it'll be ok.

That's what these girls don't have. At some point, it got too hard, for them and their parents. I don't know when that was, or what happened. But these girls are at the start of their lives. To be corny, their futures are ahead of them. They have had less than a third of my life on this planet. And they know they are alone. They know, deep down, under the defiance and the bravado, that they can't do it alone. But they are going to have to. Unless their parents change. And start being parents. Because love has to be enough. Sometimes, it has to be everything.