Ignorance is Bliss

Something I'm chewing on right now, expect disjointed thoughts...

Earlier this morning I had a conversation (via chat) with someone who called me at once "good" (as in not a hooligan - I assume) and "naive". The word gets bandied out quite a bit around me. And at times I believe that yes I truly am naive and I know it. At other times I think my steadfast optimism is often misdiagnosed as naivete. And still again I think when people see me or speak to me they want me to be naive, or at least they want me to give off the impression that I am.

I haven't decided what I am or not. But I don't exactly live in a fairytale land.

I'm not sure what's really made me think about this today, it could be a passing mention of Boston, or the thought of young naive girls, or the fact that today I moved a particular folder filled with articles, but nevertheless I'm thinking about murder and rape and why I view newspapers with trepidation.

A few years ago a very good childhood friend of mine was raped and murdered by a "street gang" in Boston. I found out via my father who found the story off the AP wire at work and recognized her name. Her family is long gone, but that's another story for another day. At first reports my friend, who I'll call Beth even though that's not her name (even though I suppose there is no protecting her now), was being bullied to join the little punk gang and when she refused they exacted "revenge." Two teenage boys and two teenage girls.

Beth was brilliant. She was pretty and smart and overly eccentric. She had the reputation of "freak" in school because she was known to hang out in the art classrooms closet and speak to goblins and fairies that she swore lived there. I found this fascinating. We would spend hours in my yard under the tropical trees setting fairy homes and making up spells of our own. I found her idea heartening and joyful, though in hindsight it may have been less imagination at work and more the remnants of abuse from her father that brought out this other world. In any case I was very much the naive accomplice, wanting to believe there was a different world to escape to just as much as she did. Though this sounds crazy, and she very well may have been, she was a good person. She was brutally honest, trustworthy, worked hard. And I know when those kids in Boston asked her to steal something in order to be part of their group...she didn't want to do it because she didn't need a group and she wasn't going to break the law.

When the story came down my hometown wrote a story just for her, listing where she went to school and where she lived and what she did when she was there. I'm certain the Boston papers simply wrote "Homeless kid dead" and left it at that.

The four kids recently went on trial and my father diligently sent me all the articles about it...after the verdict came down. I'm glad he gave them to me all in one lump. I didn't go looking for the play-by-play though I wanted to read it. But like reading an especially long and depressing book, sometimes you have to skip to the end to make sure it turns out okay before you can push through chapter 15 again. I read the last article first. They're going to jail for the rest of their lives.

I went back and read the rest of the articles after that, feeling secure in the knowledge that they were going to jail. Then I read what that trial was like. I know that lawyers are there to fight tooth and nail for their clients, that it's there job to find every angle and exploit it to their clients advantage. I know too that they often don't get a choice in who they defend or prosecute, but they have the responsibility to look beyond their own bias and do their job. I know this. I know public defenders and district attorneys have a rough job. But I can't help but hate them at times when I see a person who seemed so pure and beautiful, was such a light in my life, being defined as some dirty homeless woman who got no better than she deserved. The defense went so far as to argue that his client was the victim in all this. Somehow this trial was really about bringing down a young man of random ethnicity and making him suffer for no reason. There WAS a reason - he murdered someone.

The trial got more disgusting from there. In the end they all received life in jail. I think they deserve it. They did it, they deserve it. And nothing is better for it. They'll go to jail, then probably get out on parole. Maybe they'll get a job and raise a family and become good citizens. It happens. Maybe they'll get out and go back to living on the street and bullying and intimidating strangers. Maybe they'll just rape and murder someone else. I'm sure they're all possibilities. But even if they rot in jail for the rest of their lives, or they turn around and truly repent and end up making the world a better place - it doesn't help. Beth is still dead. She never got the chance to turn her life around, she never got the choice to be bad or good. She's still gone. And this justice thing seems ineffectual. More than that it feels as if not only was she killed, she was sullied. Dirtied by people who didn't know her and didn't care, on either side, what some street kid was like.

If Beth and I were together right now I think we'd tell each other that it was okay if the lawyers and the judges and police didn't care because someone out there does. She'd say "Katy, you care, that's all that has to matter, that's all that does matter." and I'd say...

I don't know what I'd say. I'd want to say that I don't want to know about them, I don't want to know what happened or what will happen. I don't want to think that some reporter is unbiasedly writing about some kid that got murdered, and isn't it sad. I don't want to think about the people who read the paper and say what a pity, I knew those kids are up to no good. Or the random person who asks at the water cooler "did you hear about that girl who was raped...the streets aren't safe." I don't want the streets to not be safe. I don't want to think that my friend can't go live where she wants and do what she wants without some brats trying to prove they have the power.

I think I'd say "I miss you and please come back." I think I'd say "I wish you weren't dead."

And I don't think I'm supposed to be so selfish about it. I think that as a non-naive person I'm supposed to nod and say "Beth, the world is horrible. There are thousands like you, and your not alone. I'll miss you."

I think I'd rather be naive.

And I do wish she wasn't dead.