Attempted Abduction

I keep trying to think of a better blog post, but every time I sit down to write, my thought keep going back to the phone call I got from our Superintendent about an hour ago.  He was calling to let us know of an attempted abduction from a bus stop this morning.  The driver was a white man in a black SUV.   He tried to convince the girl to get in his car by offering candy.  Apparently, he even got out of the SUV.  The girl did the right thing and ran, so she's fine--physically, but I'm sure she's more than a little freaked out.  And so are all the parents.  The Facebook page of Ellie's elementary school PTO has tons of comments.  The rumor I heard is that it was at a stop in the Greentown area, not close to us, but that's just rumor.  It's been really upsetting, coming on the heels for finishing the book The Lovely Bones.  It was supposedly a 5th grade girl, which makes me think the abductor was a novice--really, you thought CANDY would work?!?!  (Unless he had those Godiva truffles.  I might get into a car with a stranger if he offered me those.)  When I hung up the phone I turned around and saw Ellie's LaLa Loopsies all over the kitchen counter.  I was so frustrated when I saw them this morning, thinking, "I'll have to clean THAT up today!", but after the call, I saw them in a different light.  Instead of a mess to clean up, I saw a moment in time of Ellie, playing before school, quietly by herself, like she always does.  If that had been HER and not an ATTEMPTED abduction,
those little dolls would have been her last footprint in this house.  (See, just finished a book about a murdered child--probably wouldn't have thought of that had I not been in the mind of a ghost for the last few days--great book--check it out if you haven't already read it.)

So, as I go about my house work and I'm thinking about this attempted abduction, I realized that I worry so much about protecting my kids from the unseen dangers,  (Chemicals in cleaning products,  pesticides in their food, endocrine disruptors in in soaps and shampoos)  that I haven't taken the time to talk to them about the other dangers--people.  So when they get home from school, I'm going to talk to them about "stranger danger".  I've had that talk before, but it never hurts to do it again and again and again.  When I was in college my sorority had so many self defense speakers in, I thought I could teach a class on my own by the time I graduated.  But the repetition stuck with me and I still remember a lot of it today.  (A moving target is harder to hit than a still one.  If they have a gun, run anyway.  If you get in the car with an armed man, chances are you're dead anyway. )

When I went to college my mom insisted I read this book, The Gift of Fear, by Gavin De Becker.

Again, scary stuff, but very useful information.  Basically it says, trust your instincts.  If you feel there's something off, don't brush it off.  Better to be the weirdo that ran screaming from some guy who was lost and asking for directions than being Jaycee Dugard.