Little Blue Sneakers

My younger daughter Megan discovered the joy of running at Alfred University. I remember feeling worried when she told me she ran alone up a mountain.

When she was under three, she disappeared from the Dennisport Laundromat. As I shot out the back door calling her name, women went into the large parking lot facing a busy corner. Connected to the laundromat was a department store where counters were crammed with beach things, and there, a woman ahead of me called out, “She’s here.” Wearing little blue sneakers, she was happily exploring.

By second grade, she went to the YMCA for swim lessons, coming home on the Y bus. One late afternoon she didn’t appear. I called the Y and then the police. As they arrived, she came through the back hedge as day was becoming dusk. I knew the weakness of relief. She’d gotten off the bus at the top of Longmeadow Street but our road was halfway down.

At the time of the earlier parent-fears, I wasn’t in the habit of personally talking to God. Even after God had entered my life, it took me a long time to give everything to Him.

My realization is, “When we remember God as our Source, we receive comfort, stability, and strength to face what happens to us. We become as a team to slake the fear that arrives so easily.