A lot is different. A lot has changed. Change seems to be the only constant in my life right now. The weeks are flying by. I could post about how I decided that I am going to try and graduate a semester early, or how I am searching feverishly for a yoga teacher training program. But ho hum...

Something else has struck me this week instead. Something I witnessed on the L on Friday.

I was running late to my internship on Friday, the L was being a slug for no reason, and I happened to be on the wrong train cart, at the wrong time.

I had my head in this book I am reading for class-The Handmaid's Tale (which I still have 100 pages to read before I finish writing this paper I am working on), and all of sudden this man starts getting loud. Now usually I have my iPod plugged in while I am reading. I am just that amazing-I have the ability to listen to stellar tunes and read words at the same time. What a blessing. Well, I decided that day to not stuff my ears with the buds, so I was attune to the sounds of the train, conversations, and accordingly this loud man.

He had a deep voice. Was swearing profusely. And started hollering at his daughter for not drinking her juice. I did not really look over, but started to glance up from my page at the corner of my eye. He kept yelling at her, telling her to drink her juice. Well, she must have started drinking it, and got some on her hand, because he yelled at her for just that. Because apparently if she were drinking the juice correctly, there was no reason for it to spill on her small fingers? Her fragility all too present in sipping a juice...

She then moved up from her seat. He grabbed her by her small arm. Threw her back on the train seat. And then he hit her. Hard. Not like a slap. Like a forceful blow.

She started crying.

As did I, along with many others on the train.

He told her she wasn't a "diva," and that he was going to "whoop her ass" when they got home.

She was maybe 6 years old.

I have never witnessed something like this. I had seen it in movies, read about it, but never saw an innocent child hit by her own father. She was so young. So innocent.

If he felt so able to strike her in public-on a subway-then what would he do to her behind closed doors, in her own home?

We think and try to be aware of such things as child abuse and other issues that plague humanity, but is being aware enough? Is feeling for that child enough? No one said anything, I did not say anything. We are all guilty in that sense. We all observed, all witnessed, but none of us chose to act.

But what could have been done? The child had already been hit. Chances are it was not the first time. Her pain will last. And this memory will never be erased, for her, for me, and all on the train that day.

How can we stop this? How can we prevent acts like these from being committed?

I wish I would have said something.

But more so, I wish I could save that little girl and all others from their pains.

I hope one day that everyone in the world (including myself) can be filled with a little more love. A little more compassion. A little more courage.

"When you are destroying something, you are also destroying yourself, remember."-OSHO