Holding Close

When I think of children, I think of innocence.  I think of wonder.  I think of big eyes and bigger dreams.  I think of little hands taking life by the horns and loving every minute of it.  All of these qualities were violently ripped away last Friday.  As twenty sweet children walked into their safe, welcoming school, bright-eyed and ready for whatever joys were to come to them that day, their earthly world stopped. 

I am sure I can speak for most of you when I say that our hearts were placed somewhere else this weekend. For those of us in Virginia, our prayers soared north. For all of us in this country (and beyond), our anger, our sadness, and our fear - sewn together in the tightest of stitches - paralyzed us with unwavering questions.   

As we all unite to pray for those in Connecticut, remember to hold each other close, to know that love is a powerful force over hate, to fight for persistent studies on mental illness and its evolution as well as its demise, and to pray that these lost children and heroic teachers are now eternally comforted. 

"A flower bloomed already wilting, beginning its life with an early ending."

~R.J. Gonzales, Mundahlia