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WRITING CONTEST
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Lone Star Pa:
The Column On Texas Fathering
by Tom Thomas
"Are the people who crash planes into buildings
going to crash a plane into our house?" my daughter
asked me recently.
"No." Suddenly, making her feel safe was the most
important thing in the world. "Terrorists only attack
big cities like New York and Washington," I said with
my authoritative father voice. "Our city is too small
for them to mess with."
"What's a terrorists?" she asked.
I explained to her that "Terrorists are very naughty
people who hurt and scare other people they don't
agree with instead of using their words. They attack
big cities because there are more people there to hurt
and scare." A short etymology lesson followed about
the relationships to words like "terrible" and
"terror" and she interrupted me (an annoying habit of
hers).
"That's silly," she said, "The terroris..." she looked at me
questioningly as she practiced her new word,
"terrorists?" I nodded.
"The ones who were flying
the planes died too, didn't they?"
"Yes, they did," I said cautiously, "but they
believed it was worth it to hurt and scare that many
people." The thought clearly troubled her.
Of course, I oversimplified, but she's only five
years old. Then, a few days later, when she came home
from school with a picture that she'd drawn of a plane
crashing into a building and told me how she had
prayed at school for everyone who died on Sept. 11th
(she goes to a Christian school), I realized that
there was something I needed to point out to her.
Something that I think most people have missed in
this whole tragedy is a wonderful opportunity. Yes,
you read that right. This was a wonderful opportunity
to show my daughter how much good there was in the
world. Yes, you read that right, too. I told her how
people around the country had put their differences
aside to pray together, work together and heal
together. I told her how the Star Spangled banner was
played in front of Buckingham Palace (and where
Buckingham Palace was), and how people in countries
all over the world were delivering flowers to American
embassies. I told her how thousands of people rushed
to donate blood - so many that the donation centers
had to tell a lot of people to come back tomorrow. I
told her about the hundreds of heroic police,
firefighters, and "hospital workers" that were risking
their lives to help people they didn't even know. I
told her that all of these acts of kindness, support
and love proved that there is more good in the world
than evil, more love than hate. I told her that the
actions of a few mean people were small, compared to
the enormous, inherent goodness of humanity. Then I
explained what "inherent" meant.
Now, instead of worrying about being a victim, her
questions are mainly along the lines of "how can I
help?" The next day she donated some toys to a local
children's hospital. |
