I had worked on a post last night and planned to finish it today. We all have plans all the time.  We plan what we will do at work, what we will have for supper, what clothes we will wear.  We plan on our kids outliving us and being living proof that while we leave this earth – we go on, in our children and in the people we have affected while we are here.  We are not ever supposed to outlive our children.  This week not one but two sets of parents are having to experience what that is like and this is not a very big community.  The two kids who died, both in car wrecks, were both seniors in high school – one in each of the larger schools in town.  One was a band kid with ties to most of the debate kids that were at a tournament today. The other had just started speech and debate and worked at Braums.

Plans are made but in a blink, plans come to a halt and all the things that seem important aren’t even a blip on the radar.  I hugged kids today – and a couple of moms.  The debate tournament went on and the kids managed to pull it together and to love and support each other.

The kids at the other school collected money for the little girls funeral.   We see so much bad and worry about the world but in the last week I have been so proud of kids, and so heartbroken for them as well.  I don’t dare try to imagine what it is like to lose a child.  There is a part of me that thinks about my kids driving and I just want to take the keys and keep them home again like when they were small.  Then I had a little control – then I could protect them, or at least I had the facade that I could.  That facade has been gone for some time and I just keep coming back to prayer.  That is all we have left after a certain point.

That’s all I know to do tonight.  The older I get the more I believe that it’s ALL I know for sure.