OK, this is one of those moments when this mom worries, wishing only that her son could be back home, safe under her roof.
My son, who attends North Dakota State University in Fargo, is currently across the street from his dorm after a bomb threat was received and a campus evacuation ordered.
Typically this would not scare me so much. But this week marks the 11th anniversary of 9/11 and anti-American sentiments are running high in Egypt and Libya and elsewhere.
There have also been two other bomb threats in the Fargo region this week, one at Hector International Airport, directly across the street from the NDSU campus, and at the airport in nearby Grand Forks, according to an article in The Fargo Forum. That, in itself, is frightening enough.
The Minneapolis Tribune also reports a bomb threat at the University of Texas in Austin this morning from a man claiming to have planted bombs on campus. According to a source quoted in that article, the caller had a Middle Eastern accent and claimed to have ties to al-Qaida.
Coincidence or not?
My son called me about the bomb threat, to which he was alerted via a phone call. He knows nothing other than what I am sharing with him and he is relying on me for updates. He doesn’t have access to the internet. Students are milling around where he is now, directly across the street from campus. Where is he supposed to go? He’s only lived in Fargo for four weeks and it’s not like he has anyone to welcome him into their home, to provide support and updates while this is all unfolding.
Is he safe where he is now, two traffic lanes away from his dorm.
“I hope they don’t blow up my dorm,” he said.
What am I supposed to say? How can I reassure him?
I’m back here in southern Minnesota, 285 miles and five hours away.
I haven’t been able to access the NDSU website.
I am waiting, just like my boy.
Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling
Minnesota Prairie Roots 
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