Here we are in August already, the summer has just flown by. I pray that 2018 has brought good health and safety to you and your family thus far. If you could slow down for a minute and cut out the constant noise of life, you could look around without any distractions and see what’s happening everyday around us.
From big cities to small rural communities, kids are disappearing and much of it is our fault ! Does it ever make sense to buy gas at night and leave your kids in the car alone while you go in to make a purchase ? Recently a few kids and young teenagers have survived by escaping a car-jacking or having the parent return to the car to fight off the @#^&%* (insert your own expletive). As parents or guardians, we must use common sense and street smarts always to keep from making convenient choices over safe ones. Our children deserve the best we have, no exceptions, and usually it just takes a little planning on our part.
We also have kids out jogging on their own or taking short cuts thru less than desirable locations. These deviants that hide in back alleys in the dark waiting for a victim are like the vultures of society, waiting to swoop in on the weak or confused. Again, we fail when we don’t train our children to recognize dangerous areas around our homes, or how to exercise with a friend or in a group, and to take some form of extra defense every day, no matter where we go, including church and other places you think are always safe.
In Iowa on the 18th of July, Mollie Tibbetts, a 20-year-old college student went for a jog alone, may have returned to her boyfriend’s home, and has since disappeared. The family is distraught, police are following up on every lead, and the nation prays for her safe return. How can we learn from this tragedy and better prepare our children and ourselves to be protected, and use our situational awareness? Exercise is great, but not at the risk of safety.
If you find yourself without an exercise partner, especially in an unfamiliar area, don’t run alone, buy a jump rope for those occasions and stick it in your gym bag or suitcase when traveling. You’ll get a better workout in a shorter amount of time and not expose yourself to the misfits out looking for a victim. Start tuning into your sixth sense or Spidey Sense like I sometimes call in.
If you feel uncomfortable in a situation or around a person that you don’t know, get away quickly. These little internal warnings are there for a reason, and even the animal kingdom has this survival instinct, and use it daily. We should get in the habit of paying attention, and stop walking around disconnected from our surroundings, with headphones on, texting, etc. Be an example to your children, by doing the right things, not just saying them. At the point they leave the nest and go on to college or start a career, they’ll take this knowledge with them and we will have better prepared them for the evil in this world. This is our greatest calling as parents and grandparents and we need to take it seriously. I hope my next article can report that Mollie has been returned safe and unharmed. Please pray for her and her family.
Don’t be a victim…be a Street Survivor !
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Rick ‘Pirate Hunter’ Grover strongly believes we’re all in this together, and the more we learn and train, the better we’ll be prepared for any eventuality. This makes all of us part of an amazing neighborhood team of American Patriots. God Bless America ! ♦
