The ills which can plague a human heart.

I am entering a very new and uncomfortable stage of motherhood. There was a time, when whatever situation presented itself to my children, I was able to offer either a solution or comfort. Now, I find I am increasingly at loss for even finding words for the situations which are fast developing.

The Last Amazon and I were chatting last night. We seem to chat with even greater frequency than normal. I suppose both of us realize that our time together is fast coming to an end. Next year at this time, she will have left home to study at university and starting a life separate and apart from the boys and me.

She had been a little distant this weekend – chatty but not really engaged. Here but not really here. Last night I learned the cause of her emotional distance. Her best friend has confided in her that her father has just pled guilty to the sexual assault of his girlfriend’s daughter. Really there are no words to describe the incredible world of pain which has opened up for all involved. The shame, the hurt, the anger X and her sister Y feel is beyond the ability of another heart to truly weight or measure. Then of course, there is the pain the acknowledged victim has endured and will continue to endure in the years to come.

X & Y loved their father very much. I suspect it would have been easier for them if he was a distant almost mythical figure rather than their here and now beloved father. He treated the two teenage girls like princesses and now their shame knows no bounds. I think Dante had the right of it when he consigned those who betrayed others to the lowest residence in his inferno.

It made me realize, I have prepared my daughter for everything but the evil that can lie dormant and lurk in the hearts of men and women which merely waits the opportunity to manifest itself in deed. I have spoken long on the need to resist the evil inclination but her world has been so far removed from true evil. To her, the evil inclination was an unkind word or a deed of thoughtlessness and not the propensity to willfully choose to inflict grievous harm on another. Evil acts were consigned neatly to the annals of history – something which happened long ago in another time and place and not something which can happen just around the corner.

I have no solutions nor can I offer any words of comfort for all those involved. I have no words. Really. I only wish I did.