For eleven years, our family has spend our summers at Baptist Park in Mapleton, Maine.  This has always been our safe place; it's removed from civilization, the people are wonderful (I'm the one who hires them), the pace is relaxed and peaceful.  Our biggest dangers are the skunks that roam freely at night, but all that was interrupted last Friday.

.It was mid morning when a counselor approached me asking if I heard "the news".  At camp this could mean anything from which male counselor has a crush on which female counselor to a forecast of thunder showers.  Never did I imagine the news was an armed  killer was presumed to be on his way to Presque Isle, one town away from our little paradise.  Anthony Lord had shot several people the night before and was heading north.  At the time no one knew the exact number of victims, but we now know he shot five and killed two.  He also had a hostage.  And he was heading north, presumably to get revenge on someone associated with the local hospital.  The hospital was already on lock down, I was told.

Of course rumors fly at a time like this, and, because we are kind of isolated up here, we still don't know all the facts.  We have no TV, the only time I hear the radio is in my car, and I don't have tons of free time to surf the web.  My biggest concern at the time, of course, wasn't getting the details of the whole story accurately, but rather the safety of our camp full of kids who I was responsible for.  One of those kids, I might add, is my own daughter and another my niece.

By mid afternoon, we had gotten the news that Lord was arrested in Houlton, 40 miles away.  We were never in real danger, and for me it was a test of faith.  Faith in God, certainly, but also in the emergency plan we had put into place a few years ago.  All the while, I had to put on my camp face when the kids were around.  I think I pulled it off.

 In these days, all camps, schools, even churches need to have an emergency plan in place.  It CAN happen here.  To the parents who get annoyed that they have to sign their children in and out of the church nursery or wait in an orderly line to pick up their kids from school, I want you to know that your impatience, your snide remarks, your complaints are part of the problem.  By your challenging the plans that institutions have put into place for children's safety, you are not only not helping, you are siding with the likes of Mr. Lord.  Perhaps that's not your intent, but you are.  Period.

And, although he was captured an hour away from us and we were never in any harm, two of our counselors knew one of his victims who died.  One counselor's boyfriend was the victim's friend, and another grew up with him since they were in day care together.  The dad of two of our campers is a nurse practitioner, and he worked on three of the victims in the ER.  Two survived. "It" can happen here, and "it" does affect people we know.  Thank God the children in our care at Baptist Park are safe and completed their week of camp with lots of fun and laughter. Let's pray this type of danger never gets any closer to us.