To Obliviate or Not to Obliviate

Last night, I sat comforting my husband. I set aside everything I had planned to do last evening, and let him tell me about his past 48 hours. I knew something had been wrong, but I couldn't ask him about it until then.

You see, DH had been called for Federal Jury duty. Because of where we live, the Federal courts are 100 miles away, so he had to stay in a hotel. He said it was probably a good thing because he wasn't sure he would have gone back if he had come home.

The case he was put on was a sexual abuse of a minor by an uncle. He didn't tell me exactly what that entailed but based on the tears he shed, I don't think I want to know. He talked about how this 13 y.o. girl had sat on the stand and bravely talked about what her uncle had done three years prior. He said that she sat through everyone else (including her Aunt's) testimony - much of it contradictory to her own.

He said she did everything right, she told him no, she told her aunt who didn't believe her and then she told her guidance counselor.

DH felt helpless that all he could do was find the guy guilty. I told him that was a lot. That for this girl to know that people believed her did help. It gave her power. I hope I'm right about this and it's not just me wanting it to be so. If anyone has insight, please share.

But, it won't fix anything.

I wonder sometimes why we don't just have a process to erase our minds so we don't have to dream about the horrors that exist in the world. But, if we turn a blind eye to them, the horrors don't go away. I think back to the 50's when things like this weren't talked about. All the people who suffered not knowing they had the right to say "no," the power to face them in court.

Yes, we have to be aware of genocide, abuse, torture, etc. But aren't we better for knowing it exists and trying to fight it?

But, as I held my husband last night, wanting to take away he pain for this little girl, his fear that our daughters are only so safe, I wish I had a way to make it all go away. But, I'm grateful that he could turn to me as helpless as I felt.

Oh, and if anyone is wondering why this was a federal case, it is because we live close to an Indian Reservation as the defendent was Indian and this occured on an Indian Reservation it was a federal case.