Small Strokes Big Oaks

I’m at Offbeat Families today talking about the tough stuff – how I feel about having babies after the Boston Marathon bombings:

My thoughts turned to my friend at work who had given birth that day, and her baby who would always share a birthday with this tragedy. I thought of my other friend who is planning on welcoming twins into this world in October and taking the rest of the school year off to be with them. I thought of my childhood best friend whose daughter is almost a year old. And I thought, I am so lucky to not have children. Granted, their children are all too young to understand these heinous events, but they will grow older, and if this year is any indication, the world will only get worse. How do you deal with questions from a young child about why and what happened when these tragedies inevitably take place? I wasn’t even sure what I would tell my high school students in class the next day.

They say the eight-year-old boy who died in Boston that day was waiting for his dad to cross the finish line. They say his mother and sister were critically injured, as well. This could have been us. My husband, a marathon runner, has always wanted to run the Boston Marathon. We could have been there, and being in our late 20’s, we could have easily had a couple of kids in tow. We could have been cheering Dad on. And all I could think of was that I was so glad we weren’t.

Go read the whole thing, though. I think you might be surprised at the conclusion I eventually come to.