Scared

I'm writing from my heart and from probably a lot of parents' hearts.  I'm scared.  I am worried about the world my children will be adults in.  You know what I'm talking about:  these last few days with the terrorist attacks in Paris and countless other problems throughout the world.   Did I set them up for a life of scary situations?  Will they see the collapse of humanity?  Was I selfish just wanting children because it was the thing to do, not even thinking about how the world would be when they were growing up in it?
I worry about this every time something terrible happens in the world.  I feel so bad for the families of the affected and wonder if they pondered these ideas late at night as well. I wonder if all mothers throughout all of time have had this same worry?  Have they worried when Pearl Harbor was bombed that their children's future wasn't going to be growing up in a free nation?  Were the mothers who bear children in the Black Plague worried that their children were going to be the end of all generations?  Or the moms who lost children in a tsunami but then had more children, worried that their new children may come to an untimely death as well?  Maybe this is part of mother hood?  We worry about our children day in and day out.  We worry about their future, that we are doing a good enough job and they will be a good person, that the world will be nice to them, that the world may someday be a better place that the one we are living in.
I try to live in a bubble of motherhood right now.  Because, let's face it, as a mom I have a million things to worry about without the paranoia of the news channel.  I worry that my daughter is doing well enough in math and that my preschooler is nice to her friends without being a "mean girl."  I worry that my youngest is gaining weight fast enough, that I paid the electric bill on time, that the milk is on sale this week and if I can get there before it goes off sale (hey, $1 saved is $1).  But, I can't live in the bubble forever:  I see the bad things when I am on social media, on the radio in the car on the way to the school, or flashing across my phone when I'm getting ready to make a phone call.
Then I realize that if I wouldn't have risked having children in these sometimes grim times, I would have missed out on the possibility that one of them may change the world for the better. That one of them will come up with a vaccine to cure cancer or that they may see the world at complete peace someday.  I would also be denying them the chance to see the good in the world.  The chance to see the best of humanity, the thousands of good things that happen day in and day out that the news doesn't report on.  And I would have missed the chance to see the light that they bring into my world everyday.
Friends, this is a scary time.  But, as we look throughout history, they are all scary times.  And yet, good reigns.  We will point out the good to our children so they will see it everyday.  We will give our children hope.