missing

I'm not sure where the poetry will be in this post, but it is too difficult to figure out something else authentic to say. My just 14-year-old niece (my stepbrother's daughter) Rachel is missing. She never got on the bus for summer school Monday morning and she never came home. It is the kind of story that, as a parent, makes your blood run cold and your heart pound right out of your chest. But Rachel's story is a little more complex. Reports confirm that she is with a 23-year-old guy, a discharged Army officer, whom she met on the Internet. Cell phone text messaging records confirm that they planned to meet that morning. But considering that she didn't take a single thing with her when she left her house other than her backpack of school books - no money, no jewelry, no clothes, no makeup, no purse - it's pretty hard to imagine that she intended to disappear. Plus, she is really a sweet girl. Lonely, a bit of an outsider at school, very old-looking for her age, but smart and fun with my kids and tenderhearted. I am so worried about her. Today both Rachel and this guy were spotted getting into his car (plates match) in Pennsylvania. Now the FBI is involved.

On Monday night, Andrew and I spent about three hours on the Internet, reading comments on Rachel's myspace page (which few adults knew she had because she uses a false name and location, and which only "friends" can access and Andrew - cool musician that he is - happens to be one) and searching for information on the guy she's with. I came away from that time feeling incredibly sad and concerned for our youth. Does anyone really understand how HURT kids are, how damaged and lost and out-and-out lonely? It reminded of that campy film Pump Up the Volume; only this isn't Hollywood. This is real, and worse.

My kids are only little but I am thinking, thinking about what I will do when the day comes when every friend has a cell phone and a computer. When every kid they know is on myspace and facebook and finding their "best friends" virtually. But mostly I am praying, praying. I am praying for Rachel, for the guy she's with, for every lost and lonely teenager I came across on Monday night, and for mine and yours and ours . . . precious little children of God who desperately need to know who they really are.