Fear

I'm not a woman who generally lives in fear. However, tonight at the mall I was truly scared. I took the two little girls on a date. After we ate, they were playing at the indoor playground. All of a sudden I am hearing yelling. Like 100 people yelling - not screaming, not shouting, not cussing....just one long aaaaaahhhhhhhhhh that lasted for like 2 minutes. At first I thought it was maybe some kind of cultural thing I hadn't heard of, but then when the national next to me said "Que es esto?" (what is this?) which is exactly what I had been thinking, I knew it wasn't cultural. Everyone was just standing around watching these people shout and staring in disbelief. And then a group of like 20 people (the same ones who were shouting) got in a single file line and started marching through the food court, up and down the aisles through the table. They were getting closer and chanting, yelling all the way.

In all transparency, thoughts of Virginia Tech and Columbine and Church Shootings and Mall Shootings were running through my head. My human interest wanted to stick around to see what these loonies were doing, but my instinct said get out of here. I scooped up the girls and we ran to the closest department store in utter fear. Yes, I was the only one running. I was also the only gringo in the mall. Too many bad American "news" stories have gotten the best of me. I can tell you that I was so scared that I was nauseous from fear. I really felt like something bad could've happened. And once I got into the department store, I saw that the group was marching around the kid's section where we had just been. Relief that I had escaped filled my body. We quickly high-tailed it to the other side of the mall.

When I asked the security guard what was happening, he said it was just some crazy's wanting to get attention.

Indeed they got my attention and sparked a fear in my heart that I didn't know existed. I'm glad that God gave me the sense to be aware and get out of there. Even if it all did end well. You just never know! I hope I never feel that sense of "entrapment" and fear again.