early in the day ...

… our school placed all of the kiddos and teachers and staffers into “lock down” for a drill ... in case of an actual intruder entering our building.  Normally these drills take about five minutes and are just inconvenient to me.  Today’s was different.  Usually we get warning that we’ll be having this drill but we didn’t have any warning this time.  But I figured out right away that it was a drill, since we had had an email come out yesterday, going over all of the procedures. 

So, overhead, we heard that we were now in lockdown; that there was an intruder in the building. 

I turned off my lights, locked my door, hunkered down … and tried to keep working in the dark.  I heard the teachers outside in the hallways instructing their children what to do.   And then it grew eerily quiet.

Five, ten minutes passed.  Fifteen passed.  THIRTY MINUTES passed … and I was still hunkered down and in the dark but trying to work.  Cuz I’m responsible like that.  Oh, shut up.

At the 31 minute mark, I began to panic.  THIS THING IS REAL, I told myself.  And I texted a coworker.  No response.  Oh great.  The intruder got her, I was guessing.

35 minutes into it, I called our front desk and asked.  And, of course, they LAUGHED THEIR HEADS OFF AT ME!  It wasn’t long before EVERYONE stopped by just to laugh at me and ask if I was still in timeout or if I could now come out and play.    One smarty pants wanted to know if I’d caught him and what I was feeding him to keep him happy.  

I'd forgotten my lunch ... so it's a good thing I really DIDN'T have an intruder with me ... he'd have gotten mighty hungry.  Then again, I did have some bread and water I could've given him.  He's probably used to that anyway.

Jeesh.

Come to think of it, bread and water sound pretty good ... you know, since I forgot my lunch.

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