A Prayer for the Boy Who Fell

 

A prayer for the boy who fell.

Yesterday, I didn’t mean to, but I watched a twitter video that came up on my feed that upset me very much.  I was unsuspecting.  But I should have known better.  This wasn’t a tweet from someone I follow, this was a post suggested for me.

It was meant to be funny.

But it was tragic.

Sometimes I like to laugh at people falling… or penguins, or cats.  I chuckle and I relate and I enjoy the element of surprise or incredulity at how it happened.

Not this one.

There was a larger than average black boy at the top of a tall play contraption.  He was deliberating when and how he should enter this web of straps and tunnels below him where kids were crawling through.  He was just standing there at the top, about three or four levels up, when suddenly he was pushed from behind. 

He hurtled head first and went right through the layers into the second level, where the straps finally caught and held him, at least for a moment.  He was suspended there (and yes all this was being filmed) and all he could do for a moment was try to pull his shirt back up over his exposed belly… but now that he was upside down, there was almost no hope for this since gravity was against him.  That was his first thought: cover my exposure. Not: hang on and save myself from the rest of the fall.  Not: Whah.  That was scary and now I’m hurt and angry that someone pushed me when I wasn’t ready.  No.  It was: I hope no one sees my belly.  But while he was trying to manage this impossible task, something loosened

And he fell the rest of the way down.

He didn’t have his arms ready to break his fall because they had been trying to fix his shirt.

Ka-thud.  Down to the bottom of the mat.  Like a lump of laundry, just lying there for a moment.

I burn with anger and the injustice and the cruelty and the humiliation.

Someone, take that video off the circuit.

I wish I had the courage to write something to spark fury in others to get it removed, but in the moment, I just deleted it from my feed.

I removed it from my view.  How convenient for me.

But it didn’t erase what I saw.

Today I am weeping for the boy. 

How will he know safety and value and comfort?  Will he forever be known as the boy who fell?

Dear One who waited.  Good for you for daring to join in the adventure, for going up the tower.   I see you waiting to discern the best course of action; weighing the options of how to get down and how best to proceed.  I’m sorry you got pushed and put in a precarious and vulnerable position without your consent.  I’m sorry you felt exposed.  I didn’t think about that; I was worried for your safety.  I was relating to feeling scared and out of control… helpless.  And then you fell again.  Defeated, but safe.

I’m so sorry that happened to you.

I have prayed that God would surround you with blessing.  That you would feel love and have courage to keep trying.  That somehow you could find grace for yourself, for the one who pushed you, and somehow…(although I am not ready to yet), for the one who filmed you and chose to post the video of you in your frailty.  I pray for you to find grace for them, for your sake.  That you may be cleansed from vengeance, hatred, thoughts of weakness, and spared from the lie that you are not fit to join in the play, not ready to climb towers, not worthy –no.  Rather: Be spared.  Be free.  Be strengthened with truth and love and joy.

Yes, may you find grace and love and joy.

You are so important.

From a far away scared mom woman who grieves with your fear, burns at the injustice, and understands the helplessness you must have felt.

I’m so sorry.

God bless you.