His last words to me were: "Be safe." This is typical, Dad always ends the phone call that way. "I love you and be safe." Every final text message within the conversation: "Love you!!! Be safe!" Mom does the same, matter of fact. Now that I think about it, even the adults in my life who simply care about me end conversations that way. People who don't know me well enough to love me tell me to "be safe" as I'm leaving the office Friday afternoon or even sometimes when we're all rushing out of class. At first, being the defensive person that I am, I took this as an insult almost. I felt like all of these people were telling me to be safe because it was something that I wasn't doing well enough. How would they even know that though? They wouldn't. Not all of them at least. So I started thinking about this message. I started thinking about how much I should be appreciating this idea that all of these people care about my safety. I started thinking about how this idea of being and staying safe is more about continuing to keep myself out of dangerous situations, not about changing the way I am right now. That led me to my next thought, though: Is my safety always up to me?

We hear all of these stories about people getting jumped, girls getting drugged in frat basements, guys even getting drugged while already under the influence. We see it happen to our friends and our classmates. Although so much of our personal safety isn't personal, there are pieces of this idea that are up to us as individual adults and those are what we must take responsibility for. There are precautions that we must take in order to protect ourselves and that's what they are talking about. They are talking about staying with a friend because no matter how big and tough you are, you should never be alone. They are talking about using common sense, no matter the situation. Don't take drinks from people, or anything else for that matter. They are talking about being aware of the people and things surrounding you and never fully letting your guard down. They want us to stay away from the things we can't control because that's what scares parents about their children growing up in this world: drunk drivers and rape and spiked drinks. So, we have to stay away from them, as far away as we can. "Be safe." It isn't an insult. It's a reminder that this world isn't always safe and we have to protect ourselves from that.