Wow

I sometimes wonder if these maniacal reactions we see from people, when they're faced with disappointment, really are an indication of some sort of mental disability, or just another sign that we're doing a really lousy job raising our offspring.

When people aren't equipped to handle situations, they either fight or flee. Maybe we can add "totally freak out" to the occasion. There have been a slew of movies like "Fatal Attraction" the past few years, but they don't have the same appeal or attraction because a lot of us know people like that. Still scary, just not so unusual.

They had a series of raffle drawings for the kids the other night at my church. Just pulling tickets for a bunch of toys, etc, no big. But when they finished and announced the last prize, I saw three different examples of just what I'm talking about. There was one boy, big enough to know better, who absolutely threw a fit because he hadn't won anything. He began flinging the folding chairs as he stormed out of the gym. Another girl, also big enough to know better, began to scream and cry that she "wanted something", refused to leave or quiet down, and essentially had to be dragged out by he mother. The last one was another boy who was a little young, so I'm going to pass on that one. Future psycho will suffice.

Life disappoints sometimes. We don't always get first prize. It might be a good idea to stop the BS of the last 20 years and start informing our little charmers that no, not everyone wins every times. It sounds like common-sense thinking, but I'm starting to believe common sense isn't so common anymore.

The "better" we get as people, the worse off we seem to be. Unrealistic expectations only increase the bad feelings that come about when disappointment hits. Soft-soaping, sugar-coating, rationalizing, it all sucks in my opinion, because the first time these charmers get hit, they're down for the count, and it's up to the rest of us to pick up the slack.

That's ungood, to say the least, huh?