Children Living In Abandoned Bus: INFURIATING!

Usually when I write a new blog post, I try to be a little upbeat and leave the whiny-ness at the door. Or at least I try to keep it short and get to a more cheerful point to write about. Unfortunately, this post is a more controversial topic, and I'm quite angry as I write it.

I try to take news reports with a grain of salt. By doing that, I have to remember that most of the time the news has most of any popular story at least half wrong. I learned this while I was working for the Department of Forensics, and I can't believe how much stories can change from night to morning due to the media coverage. I know they're just posting stories they hear, but I wish there was some way to verify the facts for sure before some stories are published. In saying that, I'm trying to have an open mind about the story I'm about to share with you, but it's really hard to not see the whole picture. I'm praying that some new news will come out in the short future that will make this story seem a little less... pathetic.

In Splendora, Texas, two children, a girl age 11 and a boy age 5, have been discovered by authorities to have been living in an abandoned bus that was converted to a home. One of the bad points is that the kids have been living there since 2009!! Here is the story and information links, so you can see it for yourself. Make sure you watch the video and read the story, because they are both very informative. I'll write more about it after you watch.

Children Living In Abandoned Bus (VIDEO)

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/children-found-living-abandoned-bus-texas-15874754#.T1kBgDE7WwA

When I first read this story and watch the video showing the outside deplorable conditions, I immediately had a lot of questions that I'm sure law enforcement officials are still trying to figure out. One could say that the parents are lousy individuals due to the fact that they are in jail for embezzling money from Hurricane Katrina victims. Lousy "Individuals" yes, but does that make them bad parents? No. What makes them bad parents is the fact that they hopped off to jail and didn't alert officials that maybe their two kids at home needed to be taken care of. I find it absolutely horrible that the parents are warm, dry, and fed 3 meals a day  all the while knowing that their children are pretty much fending for themselves. How can you even sleep like that?

I commend the Great Aunt for providing food for the children and for working to try to support them, but I believe there comes a time when you have to admit that maybe there is a better place for the children to live while you work to secure a stable living environment for them. The children said they were home-schooled, but wouldn't it seem easier to send the kids to public school all day and know that they were warm and being supervised in a learning environment? And there was a neighbor that said the child told her daughter that she only showered twice a week. Where did she take a shower? And if the neighbor knew this, I wonder why she didn't alert the authorities before now about the conditions. I just know that if there was an abandoned school bus next door to my house and I knew that two little children were living there, running around without shoes, living with no adult structure or supervision, I would try my hardest to make sure those children were in a stable home ASAP. And I definitely wouldn't be on national television telling the police that I knew about the condition of the children and I did nothing about it. She admitted that she saw the kids running around outside at night with no shoes on...

I'm thankful for the person who secretly alerted authorities about this bus and these children, because at least now these children have a fighting chance of learning what the life of a child should be like. The 11 year old girl has so much responsibility for a child, caring for her younger sibling, and her years to be a little girl have been stripped from her. The filthy living conditions are probably the only place the younger child has ever knows, because the authorities believe the children have lived there since 2009, meaning the child was only 2 years old when he started living in the bus.

I just look at my own childhood, and I can't imagine how different my life might have been if I didn't have such a wonderful loving family to take care and raise me. They taught me about life to make me the woman that I am today, and that foundation is so essential in making sure I myself remember who I am. Who was going to teach these children what it is like to be a responsible adult? They're own parents didn't have that figured out. And talking in the here and now, who is going to teach them how to be children or help them learn how to have manners? Who is going to show them how you are supposed to treat someone that you love?

This is a story that needs to be wrapped in prayer. More than once we've all heard horror stories about foster homes and siblings being split up. I pray that these children are put in a loving home and given all of the love and compassion that they have been lacking. I pray these children are given a home with parents who have the necessary patience to guide these kids in their lives. Sometimes, it takes one person to make a difference in another life, and in this case there are two little lives waiting to be loved. I just pray that love is what they find!