I’d like to start with the other half of a story you may have seen today, the story of a man named Martin Gill. He took in two little boys one December just to have “a decent Christmas”:
A decent Christmas didn’t seem too much to ask. He said yes.
So that night, two small boys, one 4 years old and one 4 months old, came to Martin Gill’s home. The 4-year-old had on a dirty adult T-shirt and sneakers so small he wore them like flip-flops. Both boys were sick. The older boy’s medicine was unopened and expired, the baby’s barely touched.
The 4-year-old did not speak, and seemed mostly unresponsive. The only thing he cared about was changing, feeding, and taking care of his baby brother. Gill… quickly realized that this 4-year-old was the baby’s primary caretaker.
After about a month, the older boy finally began to talk. It quickly became clear that he had never seen a book, couldn’t distinguish letters from numbers, couldn’t identify colors, couldn’t count, couldn’t hold a pencil. At dinner time, he’d ask for more food at the start of the meal, hide it, and then sneak it into his bedroom because he was afraid it would run out. Gill… slowly got him to stop doing that by keeping plenty of food in the house and showing him at the start of meals that there was lots of food.
The boys have now been with Martin Gill… for four years. The experts and the judge have a lot to say about just how good that is. The kids have structured lives; they’ve lived in one place all four years, they eat meals together and talk (no TV or phones answered during meals), they go to school. They have friends. They have a family…. They have a grandmother. Gill even bought a Ford minivan.
The remarkable part of this story is that a court in the state of Florida said that finally, Mr. Gill and the grown-up love of his life can finally adopt these boys. You see, Mr. Gill and his partner are gay.
If you are at a loss for something to be thankful for, try the fact that this family can now work to make itself official.
In closing: things are tough all over (the world); a bill proposing single payer health care (true universal medicare for all, not mandatory health care) has been introduced; and Stupid CEO Tricks would be a whole lot funnier if we all hadn’t bought front row tickets.