A Reminder of Things We'd Rather Forget

Myshel came home from school yesterday and announced that her keyboarding/computer teacher is missing. So, my response was, "what do you mean missing?" She handed me a note from the school. Her teacher had gone to a party on Friday night, made a phone call around 1AM and hasn't been seen or heard from since. His car was found on an on ramp to the interstate, but no one knows where he is. He's an official missing person with the police department. The note went on to say that counselors are always available for the children if they need it and also a list of behaviors that's normal for children when something like this happens to someone they know or care about. That's scary. Myshel said she thought it was sad and that it must be hard for his family, but she didn't say a lot else. I chose to wait until later to talk to her about it. I noticed later when Vance wanted to go get the mail after it was dark, that she didn't want him to go. I asked her why. She said that she didn't want him to end up like her teacher and just disappear. I don't think she was overly worried about that happening, but this whole thing with her teacher has definitely made her think about things. I did sit down and talk with her then about how she was feeling about the whole thing. Mostly, it's just reminded her about the dangers out there in this world and that it can happen to anyone, which is scary. On one hand that's probably not a bad thing, because then she realizes that bad things do happen and we need to be cautious, especially in certain circumstances. On the other hand, it's very sad and scary that my children have to be so away of the evils that are out there and their childhood innocence, in that respect, is taken away from them.