On a serious note.

Every now and then a horrible story makes the prime time news. A child is killed, or luckily escapes, after years of physical abuse. Each and every time one of these stories hits the airways, the newscaster questions how the abuse went unnoticed for so long.

I don't believe it goes unnoticed. I believe the general public is too scared to speak up. Too scared of what? I don't know. But our experiences this past weekend have convinced me.

The Tatiman has great big blue eyes, and acts like the Mayor of Munchkin land when we are in public. He thinks his stroller is the lead car in a parade, and he waves and pipes up "Hello" to every.single.person we pass. Needless to say, he garners a lot of attention from baby loving folks.

We celebrated July 4th visiting friends in California. The Tatiman and I flew cross country earlier in the week, and DH followed us out before the weekend. Tatiman made friends in every single line we waited in, exchanged flirts with people in every single elevator. And had no less than 50 people in his airplane fan club. Mayor Tatiman had a blast leading the cross country party.

The Tatiman also learned to walk in California. His first trick was falling, face first, into a glass coffee table at our beach condo. Within moments one of his big blue eyes was swollen and surrounded by bruising. Nothing like celebrating his first Independence Day with a shiner. So much for those adorable pictures in his patriotic outfit.

Thankfully, the Tatiman did not seem to experience much pain. After about 30 seconds of crying the episode was over, as far as he was concerned. We were surrounded by friends, and didn't really notice anything 'off' until we began our trip back East.

Nobody waved at the Tatiman. Nobody commented on his big blue eyes. Nobody asked me how old he was. Nobody laughed when he pointed at the lights on the plane and yelled "Light on!" in his silly little voice.

EVERYBODY stared. Everybody gave DH and I the once over...and then went back to what they were doing, glaring up at us ever so often.

In an entire 8 hour day of travel, exactly three people commented on the Tatiman at all. One, a father of 2 boys, struck up a conversation in the airport by saying "Hey Boxer" to the Tatiman. That gentleman shared a story of his oldest son's first black eye, and when I told him that he was the only person to comment, his response was "Yeah...but you know everybody is looking." A lady getting on the plane after us asked if he was in a bar fight, and then continued on to her seat. And one other woman commented, after sitting in front of us the entire flight, that he was a well behaved baby (true)--no mention of the eye.

Once we got home I asked DH if he noticed that nobody interacted with the Tatiman the whole day, and almost nobody commented. We had come into contact with over 200 people, easily--and a measly three showed enough interest in a clearly injured child to speak up. We both agreed that this is how abuse goes "unnoticed." It is noticed, but nobody does anything about it.

I would have preferred 200 people asking me how he got his black eye, to 197 glaring at us and turning a blind eye. I have faith in humanity because of those three. Three people trusted their gut enough to strike up a conversation with us. I'm sure they were trying to feel us out a bit, see how we reacted to comments about our little bruiser. I hope that if they felt anything was off, they would have reported us. We need more of those people. We need people who are looking out for the littlest folks, who can't look out for themselves.

Please, please, please...if you see something that seems out of the ordinary...don't hesitate to speak up. You could get a funny story about a newly crowned toddler...or you could save a life.