What Would You Do

Yesterday was a difficult day as we attended a funeral service for a family we know through Alyssa's dance class.  One of her fellow dance class girls passed away unexpectedly last Saturday.  The service for Madeleine was beautiful and the parents were incredible as Jesus lifted them up to make it through the service, they were so brave and inspirational in the face of such a devastating time for them.  Throughout the service there was a slideshow playing with mountains of family pictures, it was so easy to see how important their children are to this family.  13 years old is just too early to be gone.

We've always told our kids how important they are to us.  That I would kill to protect them.  That I would die to save them.  That I would be devastated to lose them. That we harp on being smart and safe not because we want to be the Fun Police (yes, I make the siren noise....) or to ruin the joys of the teenage experience (which from my experience usually involved something embarrassingly stupid....) but that we couldn't bear to lose them.  For us as parents, there is nothing even close to this as being the worst thing we could imagine happening.  Yesterday was a blunt reminder from life that every day with our kids is precious because it could indeed be the last one. 

When we went through the adoption process, it was not hard at all to find kids that needed a home.  In fact it was really shocking and sad to see the overwhelming number of kids in the world that are just plain unwanted.  No one wants them or really cares.  I mean we all see the commercials to feed an orphan for $25 a month, or hear the stories of children dying every day from starvation and disease, but that's usually the extent of the average persons interest.  For our family we were called to do more, which is why there are two more kids who now have a family and a home, and a dad that would kill to protect them, die to save them, and be devastated to lose them. 

There are still tens of millions of kids that need that all over the world.  What will you do.