Read Between the Lines

My daughter and I attended an SCBWI Writers Conference in Arlington, Texas, a couple of years ago. My son was two months into a three-month assignment in a hot spot on the other side of the world where phone and Internet capabilities were limited. During the morning of the second day of the conference, he sent me an email telling me he wanted to Skype with me that day, and gave me instructions how to set it up so we could see each other as we visited. The time difference was seven hours ahead of us, and he said he had to wait until late at night to call when the usage was lower.

Conference attendees had a thirty minute break at 2:00 p.m., so I tried to connect with him, but the calls kept failing to go through. At 3:30 we were sitting at a table directly in front of the stage listening to one of the keynote speakers when somebody's cell phone started ringing. Loudly. I looked around to see whose it was before I realized it was my laptop ringing like a phone. I opened it up, and there was Van's face grinning at me.

I was horrified that my laptop had so rudely interrupted the speaker, but the momma in me wasn't about to miss this call. I leaned over and whispered to the screen, "Just a minute," grabbed my laptop and started working my way through all the tables in the conference room to get to the hall outside. When I finally sat down in front of the laptop, Van was laughing his head off.

I asked him what was so funny, and he said he'd called all of his co-workers over to meet his mother, and all they saw for a long minute or so was my striped chest bouncing up and down on the screen while I was trying to get out of the conference room. By the time my face was back on the monitor, all the other men had slunk away, probably too embarrassed on my behalf to meet me. That's not the first time I've embarrassed my son, but I figure that's just one of my jobs as his mother.

Less than a year later my grandkids' other grandma called and asked if I'd heard the news of the four Americans' demise in a place that rhymes with 'ten gauze ee,' and I told her yes. She asked if I was okay, and again, I told her yes. It wasn't until some time later that it finally dawned on me that this was the same place my son had been assigned ten months before. And he had been providing security for the same person that had been killed. It hit me like ice water the danger my son's job often takes him, and then for a while, I wasn't okay. I immediately called him 1. to hear his voice, 2. to find out if he was okay, and 3. to hear his take on the situation. He has a group picture with the am bass a door, who he said was very nice and very good at his job. And he was there because he wanted to make a positive difference in that part of the world. It saddens me every time I see that photograph.

My son told me years ago when he was assigned to his first danger post to not worry about him. He said  that when his time was up, it was up, no matter where he was stationed. He said he could be walking across the street in DC and get hit by a car. Since then I've tried not to worry unless he gives me good reason to.

I wondered if I should even write this post since some big outfit with three initials is scrolling through all of our communications and blogs looking for certain keywords. If I get a knock on my door by some men in black, I'll try to keep you posted. But if this blog disappears, you'll know why. : )