God Is Dead And 10,000 Social Workers Have Risen To Take His Place

Going to a human services conference can be an interesting experience, especially when you, as a human, have been serviced so much in the past nine and a half months.

I can see it now, lines and lines of broken human beings, one by one being put on hoists like a car. With much pneumatic noise in the air, social workers rush in to tighten all their loose screws.

A great cosmic pit stop.

Well, that's kind of how my brain works. No matter where I go or what I do, I can stop without meaning to and totally have a moment of cognitive dissonance.

I am among hundreds and hundreds of amazing people doing amazing work.

And the world is so broken and the task is so big and I just have to have a moment to take it all in...

And then my brain just sort of skips ahead to visions of a real body shop...

And then somebody bumps my elbow as they hurry by and I'm torn from my daydream to find myself standing in front of the booth of a group that is all about fatherhood...Did you know that fathers are not only wonderful and great but are also a necessity? And in times of severe deprivation, they can be used as a viable protein source by cannibalistic societies? Hooray for fathers! Giving it their all!

Yeah, I went THERE too. I know I stood in front of their booth, staring at them for longer than was socially acceptable and quite a few thoughts ran through my mind but thankfully I shook myself out of the urge to verbalize them and I made a quick turn and walked in the opposite direction...

and nearly tripped over the MN Sex Offender Program's booth.

In my head, I was thinking "oh, HELL no!" but once again, I think I just sort of stood there gaping like a fish out of water. The woman at the booth gave me a quizzical look and said in a very upbeat tone "So, are you interested in a job with the MN Sex Offender's Program?"

In the period of three minutes, I had gone from visualizing an entire universe of broken people to the tragedy of shitty fathers to the bigger trauma of meeting STBX's new foster family.

"Nooooo," I know I sounded batshit crazy at this point. "My daughter's offender is in Moose Lake and someday, I hope to not be married to him so I don't think I'm your best potential employee..."

She never missed a beat. She just smiled and said "I think you're right."

Well, everybody needs to be right at least once in a day.