Rescue 911

When I was in the second grade it was awesome when we had a substitute teacher...not because we could take advantage of her, but because we often times were in the care of one particular substitute teacher. Her name was Ms. Martin...and she was a 9-1-1 operator. (Remember this Lauren?) This was at the time that the show "Rescue 911" was at it's peak and there was nothing better than listening to her stories. In order to hear her 911 stories we had to behave ourselves and finish our work quickly so that there would be time before it was time to change classes. (Looking back this woman was smart...) We lived in south Dallas, so there were some intense stories (some graphic enough that I cannot share them). I'm not sure how she got away with telling us the gory things that she did...I guess it was so good, that none of us would tell on her.
As a mother there are a few things that you do not want to see in front of your house...one of them is a fire truck...
Clay and I were on our great screened-in porch reading in our rocking chairs, the wind was blowing & it was raining. A perfect afternoon, if you ask me. Then, Clay jumped up and shut our back door. Our locked back door. Luckily...I am not a person who freaks out. I called Clif, who is extremely busy on Friday nights...he is usually out of contact from about 5 pm until he gets home around midnight. I called anyway, he was less than thrilled with me & went to a computer to look up a locksmith. My mind started working in the mean time...I tried to get Clay to unlock to door, no luck. Then I started thinking about the candle burning behind him & the stairs that were right around the corner. I could see two potential disasters and so I called 911. Calling 911 seems dramatic to me...it should be respected & reserved for people who have burning houses and things of that nature. But, it was my child banging on the glass door, crying "Mommyyyyyy" so I put it in the emergency category. We live really close to a station so they got here very quickly and determined that we have a really secure home. Nowhere to break in! So, one guy tried to get in with a credit card and the rest of the group prepared to break a window downstairs...thankfully credit card guy won the race and Clay was safe. I didn't realize that I was so nervous until they had gone and I thought about things that could have happened. I was glad to hug my boy again! Clay recovered quickly - we walked to the front yard and he saw that there was a fire truck in front of his house! That is about as good as it gets for Clay. So, we averted disaster...for now.