Oklahoma City

Yesterday marked the 15th Anniversary of the Oklahoma City Bombing. We were living in Michigan at the time. And we had good friends & some family from Oklahoma. My oldest son, Kyle, who will turn 20 in a few short months, (ouch!) was 4 years old at the time, just short of turning 5.

All kids know when their parents are upset about something, and we've always tried to be honest with our kids about what's going on in the world, though we are very careful not to scare them. We talked about what had happened in Oklahoma. Kyle went to a Lutheran pre-school at the time. And because there were many children killed & families affected, his class made cards to send to the victims of the bombing.

One day we had gone out to eat & Kyle asked our server for a balloon, they had tied around the restaurant. She let both our boys choose just what color they wanted. Zach is just 16 months younger than Kyle. They both loved balloons. They would play with them in the car, hitting them back & forth, sometimes getting in the way of, & annoying the driver! :) Any place that had balloons was an exciting place for two little boys!

As we were leaving the restaurant, we got outside & Kyle opened his little hand, releasing his balloon! I said "You really wanted that balloon, why did you let it go?" And he said very a matter of factly "I let it go so all those kids from Oklahoma can play with it in Heaven!" I, of course started to cry & Zach soon followed suit letting go of his balloon as well. And for awhile after that, every balloon my boys got they sent up to heaven . . . We remember.