Wow, it's so hard to think of anything to write today, in light of the tragedy in Connecticut. As I was driving home from work yesterday, I heard interviews on NPR with the teachers.I wanted to cry but I didn't want to wreck the car.
The last time I taught anything was in 2007 when I taught first graders in Vacation Bible School. They were so precious. Michael had just come home, and he was the same size as most of my first graders. He hated to leave me all morning, but he was in the third grade class and Alesia was in there as a teacher's aide, and was translating for him.
This is Michael during that time.
I wish the news media would leave all those children that lived through this tragedy completely alone. Those children have a long road ahead of healing. I'm sure many of them have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Children can have that too, it's not just soldiers that get it.
I've shared here how Michael lost his hand, due to frostbite after a severe beating. That such brutality was inflicted on a little 5 year old is tough to imagine and I don't want to think of it.The only good thing about it was that there was an article about it in the paper, and the memory of it, even three years later, is what prompted the assistant principal of the orphanage to get Michael out of the shelter and to the big orphanage where she worked. As orphanages go, the Regional Boarding School in Petropavlovsk isn't too bad. Michael spent two years there before I adopted him. So out of evil, ultimately, my son was rescued.
Here's a message for everyone, though.
Michael survived a terrible, senseless tragedy. He has to live with the consequences every day of his life.
BUT
He has no memory of what happened that day. None. This is how God helps to heal us. He cannot stop evil. He can help us heal, though.
It's for the grownups to remember, and to try and prevent that same tragedy from ever happening again.
One of my many prayers is that the children who survived the horror of yesterday will heal and thrive as much as my son has healed.
