shelter

Fall is setting in. Our high temperatures here are dipping into the low 50's. Hard to believe that just two months ago, we were in the throws of summer. And summer for me means an annual trip to the state fair.




I'm sure yours look similar to ours...
Crowds. Heat. The smell of deep fried everything.



Well, this year the fair taught me quite a lesson.


Ninja and I had gone together. It was getting dark, somewhere in that dusky gray stage that happens about 9 pm. The once soft breeze began to pick up speed, and the sky grew ominous-- like a thunderstorm was on the way. Suddenly, a huge wall of wind came from out of nowhere. They're called micro-bursts--Hurricane strength winds that only last for a minute or two. Only I didn't know that at the time.

I heard screaming and looked up to see the sky around me filled with all kinds of blowing debris, swirling and hurtling every which way. Some of it was small stuff--wrappers and cardboard boxes, but other stuff was bigger, scarier--poles from canopy tents and small boards whooshing by. My eyes stung with the dust blowing into them. I could see parents hovering protectively over their frightened children. Much of the crowd was rushing, panicked, towards exits. A piece of something struck me hard and sharp in the back.


I looked around, terrified myself now. What was happening? Were we in the middle of a tornado? Sparks erupted from a building across the fairground. I looked around for somewhere to take cover....but where do you go in a place like this?:

In a place where everything is meant to be quickly taken down and moved away? Where nothing is staked down? Nothing permanent? It was a genuine moment of terror....and clarity.

How could I not see the truth in such a scene?

I think about the world--the up and down-ness of it all. The scary twists and turns it takes. Do I have a place to take shelter when those things happen? Have I created a place for my children to take shelter? For certainly everything has to seem doubly frightening in their eyes, so dependent upon others to care for them.

I ran across a quote not long after my experience at the fair: "A child has the right to feel that in his home he has a place of refuge, a place of protection from the dangers and evils of the outside world. Family unity and integrity are necessary to supply this need." (David O. McKay)

I know that I can't give them the same kind of unity and integrity I could have before the divorce. I'm just...me. But I do what I can. I cleave to as much of a routine as possible--praying together, eating together, reading together, playing together. I try to give them opportunities to spend one on one time with me so we can talk about things they're worried about. We treat one another and our home with respect.

I don't know what more to do. I worry for my children greatly. They're good boys, but I know how kids-- especially boys--of single parent homes can really struggle. I hope, for now, and for as long as it will take for our life to really feel "normal" again and not like we're walking shades of what we used to be, that what I am doing is enough.

Any advice you have on how you provide a shelter for your kids would be greatly appreciated. And I hope you've figured out where your shelter is... And that it's not a corn dog stand.