In early 1998, I was working with 3 of 5 brothers from a high risk family.
Their two older brothers had already spent prison time in Huntsville and would return there more than once.
Of the three I started with, I had hopes for the younger 2 but the oldest had already developed habits that would end up having him join his older brothers in prison.
D ( 12 ) was the oldest. C ( 10 ) was the middle and J (9) was the youngest.
I had the highest hope for C. He was intelligent, a hard worker and a kind generous young man.
The summer of 1998, I had planned to take all the boys to Hurricane Harbor. The alcoholic mother and stepfather had already informed me that D was grounded and could not make the Hurricane Harbor trip.
That Saturday morning, my son, the other 9 boys and myself went by to pick up C and J. C and J met us in the front yard and we all went to the back yard to say good bye to the “parents”…. even though it was only 9:30 AM, both of them had been drinking heavily and were obviously inebriated.
The mother did the talking… she talked to me and asked why I was wasting my time on any of her sons… said that C and J were nothing but worthless jail bait, etc… right in front of C and J, with his friends and I listening… you could see C and J shrinking with embarrassment. The mother then told me that C and J were grounded and could not come with us.
We maintained our youth ministry work with all 3 boys. Both C and J graduated from high school and stayed out of jail. C has a young family now and lives in east Texas where he has worked for a moving company the past 9 years. J has worked in the construction business ever since he graduated. D did end up in legal trouble and is struggling.
C ended up taking their parents under his care. Both parents have serious health problems due to their heavy drinking.
I am very proud of C and know he will continue to do well.