Is It Safe?

The most common response to the news that my 13 year old is going on a (chaperoned) trip to Germany is "Is it safe?" Safety. It is an interesting question to me, because it is based on an assumption that world in which we live, here in America, is "safe". I suppose relatively, it is. My children are not in a war torn county, they have all their needs met, they have clean water to drink, and they have parents that love them.

Increasingly, the evening news and newspapers point out, however, that even here, where we consider life "safe", it isn't for many people. Daily, I read about crashes on the local, unsafe highways. The news is full of violence on children, violence by children. Children abducted as they sleep from their own beds, or on their way to the local store blocks from their homes. Methamphetamine labs seem to be the new cottage industry around here. TV shows and video games intrude into our homes with material that no child should see, and perhaps no adult.

One of my most fundamental wishes for my children is to protect them and keep them safe. So how does one send them out into such a large world? If I could, I would go with her, not making her anymore safe, but assuring myself daily that she is indeed safe. The hard part isn't letting her go, it is staying home and waiting for her return.