When the Lake Goes Dry

I remember The Crawdad Song by Chuck Cheesman from my childhood.



I've heard different versions of it. Whatcha gonna do when the lake goes dry? The creek goes dry? The well goes dry? Anyway you look at it, there's no water there. We humans are funny, how we keep going back to a place that has nothing for us.

She was pushing 90 when she died. Her son, a man in his 50's who was old enough to know better, never stopped trying to get her approval. She died without ever giving it to him. He had done it his entire life, which must have been so painful. I watched him do it for over twenty years, and it was so excruciating just to be a witness.

Can people change? Absolutely. If they see the need to change and if they want to change, and then if they are willing to do the difficult work needed to make it happen. There are many success stories in life, of people clean and sober for years, of married couples on the verge of divorce who save their marriage, of people who stop handing down the abuse from one generation to another. Their dry creekbeds flow with cool, clear water once again.

Sometimes the very people we love most in life can't or won't give us what we need. They won't change. And we can't change them. But you know what we can do? We can stop expecting them to change. We can stop going back time and again and getting hurt. We can find other healthy ways to get our needs met. There is water everywhere. It is plentiful. So here's the heads-up, in case you've missed it. There ain't no crawdads in that hole, Honey.

Susan