SoCS Saturday- As the saying goes…

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “a phrase you grew up with.” Include in your post a phrase your mom/dad/grandparent/sibling used all the time when you were growing up, or just write whatever inspires you based on that phrase. Enjoy!

This is a premature posting. I hope no one minds. My schedule for tomorrow is hectic and I didn’t want to miss this prompt.
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I’ve had an old, and widely used, saying rattling in my brain lately. This prompt couldn’t have come at a better time!
My parents often remarked to the child version of me, “Don’t make a federal case out of it.”
Little kids, and all teenagers, tend to ‘panic’ when their immediate ‘gratifications’ aren’t met. There’s a good reason that this happens…they have yet to learn how to prioritize their problems, or needs, in a mature fashion because they’re kids.
Remember how forgetting your library book on ‘library’ day was an “end of life” crisis?
We laugh now but those struggles and emotions are all too real to the 10-year-old who is experiencing that kind of emergency!
Hard as it is to believe, many ‘adults’ want a “federal case” on everything today. Stranger still, our media is calling everything a “crisis” purposefully promoting that reaction!
Well, sensationalism IS good for that business. Money talks louder than principle after all.
It just seems like adults, with a healthy mature outlook, wouldn’t be falling for it in such large numbers.

The use of that saying held a wise message during the time I grew up. To me, it asked for a prioritizing of what I found troubling. It also asked me to pause and use my head. I don’t know anyone who would propose a total meltdown for every disappointment. How exhausting for the person having it AND those being subjected to it! What modern society calls being ‘triggered’*, we used to call a ‘tantrum’. Fortunately, only kids (and unstable adults) were prone to tantrums, once upon a time.
Nowadays? Meltdowns are more common than… sense.
This isn’t a good look or sign of any stabilizing maturity.
Don’t forget, that tantrums used to be handled by ignoring them or punishing those who were exhibiting a need for a “reality check”. Either way, those eruptions were quickly curbed because they weren’t allowed to get any results.
From watching the news, specifically the commentators and those ‘looked up to’ for leadership, there’s a current effort to promote ’emotional unraveling’ on EVERY topic to unhinged extremes. Adults are clearly not in-charge anymore. That makes me very nervous about the future. [ Don’t overlook that the chaos and unrest -created by the ‘unhinged’- is used against our own interests by corrupt forces. It makes for a lovely diversion of our attention away from truly critical matters.]
Here’s an idea?
Perhaps we should bring back the saying, “Don’t make a federal case out of it.”, starting an overdue journey back toward maturity and common sense.
First action? Posting it on a banner in the halls of Congress. 😉

Happy Saturday friends! Cheers!

* If this post ‘triggers’ you, try taking deep breaths or having a glass of wine.