The Serenity Prayer has saved my life more times than I can count.

It did it again this week, when word hit the newsroom that the bomb threat at Warren Central Junior High was more than a kid making a phony call to the school office in hope of getting out of a test.

I’m someone who lives life with a plan. I try to work that way, too: Make a plan, work that plan. Life often throws a wrench in my plans, so I’ve had to learn to improvise. But it’s not any fun.

Terri Frazier, who typically covers lifestyle stories for us, became our staff photographer for that news event on Wednesday — and wow! What a job she did.

I’m sure Terri had lots of other plans for herself that afternoon and night. It is, after all, the Christmas season. She has children and grandchildren to think about. I’m sure she didn’t plan to spend the afternoon with a camera at the school, or chasing police personnel to the scene of their search for the makings of the device taken to the school on Wednesday.

Yet, late into the night, she was there, or at our office, doing whatever was needed of her.

Terri saw the student’s parents, saw how distraught and shaken they were, saw the disbelief and shock in their eyes, and it touched her. Like many of us, she had a “there but for the grace of God go I” moment.

Terri’s poignant column in Saturday’s paper showed the depth of her empathy for those parents.

When I think about that event this week, I can’t help but go back to the needlessness of it all. Our children have lost their innocence, and that’s such a shame.

A poor decision by this young man is going to cost him years of woes. In fact, that immature decision at such a tender age will likely alter the course of his life forever. It will certainly change the course of his family’s life, too.

They have to worry about the fate of their child, not the mention the legal fees that will come along with this event.

We’ve got to wonder why? Law enforcement authorities say the device the student brought to school, if it had detonated in a building full of students, would have caused little to no damage. Why, then, did the child bring it to school? Was he being bullied and had he reached the end of his rope and not know where to turn for help? Hopelessness is a horrible emotion for anyone, much less a child.

Or, was the student trying to impress his peers?

We many never know the answer to those questions.

Thank goodness the plan our school district and law enforcement and emergency management agencies have in place for just such an event worked so well. I hope they don’t have to use it again for a very long time. Still, we’re left to mourn the fact that our children, many of them, are troubled. Why? How can we, as member of their village, help them? How can we alleviate from their young lives some of the stressors that are weighing on them? How can give them a little longer to live in that wonderful state of innocence all children should live in?

We need a plan.