Episode 60

My life as a sitcom has continued this week. First I got stuck at the airport with no method of showering, so I stink beyond belief. My family even told me and A that we smelled a bit. If we were cartoon characters, we’d have had those little green squiggly lines coming off our bodies. To make it better, neither of us had brushed our teeth because we had no toothpaste and our toothbrushes were in our luggage, in CT. Not attractive. Not one bit.

Hours later, I get to my hotel, with the intent of showering and to my luck, my toilet overflows. No toilet for 24 hours. Yes, I could have called maintenance, but I had already emptied my suitcase (read: took things out and threw them on tables, chairs, and the bed). I really just wanted to shower. I didn’t want to wait around for a maintenance worker to come in an hour. I hadn’t really slept in2 days and dealing with people wasn’t on my to-do list. So my toilet overflowed, but I had to go to the bathroom, so I kept using it. And it kept filling and flooding. I’m sure they loved me when they came to fix it! Sorry, Courtyard. I should have bought toothpaste on my way to the hotel since I didn’t actually go home between CA and RI, but I forgot all about it. Showering was on my mind. That is all, nothing else. So I went to bed, and woke up the next morning still feeling gross. I brought g my toothbrush with me to my school visits, purchased toothpaste on the road, and ended up brushing them in a McDonalds bathroom. Again, the arches save the day!

Today, the episode continues. I’m thinking I should be on primetime television. This could compete with Two and Half Men. I walked into my first school of the day and I was sitting in the Guidance office for 15 minutes or so. As I was sitting there, I noticed near every door was an Emergency Protocol sign which instructed people in Guidance to exit out to the left and go down to the football field. Counselors were to take all the students in the office with them. I thought it was odd to have 3 of these signs in one small room, but figured maybe it’s for snow or floods or something pretty common. At least they are prepared.

So I’m at a school giving a presentation in a conference room which was very obviously a former closet. There was a maintenance ladder going up through the missing ceiling tiles, random chairs on top of the tiny table, and a whole shelf of basketballs. It was a big group, about 15. I’m almost done with the presentation when an announcer comes over the intercom. “This is a lock down. We are in lock down.” The kids scream at me to shut and lock the door, which I am standing in front of. One kid tries to calm me down by telling me this happens all the time. “Last week they caught the idiot who brought the gun to school.” SERIOUSLY?! Where the heck was I?! Another girl tells me that protocol says we were supposed to crouch in the corner, but there were no windows, and frankly no room, so we didn’t move. No wonder this place had emergency signs all over. It was a mad house! Another kid says it happens all the time, but no one knew if this was a drill or the real deal. So we sat. And sat. And sat. One girl kept trying to open the door to peek outside. I shouted at her and slammed the door shut. “DO YOU WANT TO DIE?! I DON’T!” After 20 minutes or so I started getting nervous. It’s hard to maintain your professionalism when you think you are going to die. That kinda goes out the window. I tried to keep calm and used the opportunity to talk about U-’s safety systems. One girl went on her Blackberry and was reading people’s status messages. Apparently it was drug search. I could hear the dogs and people shouting in the hallway. At least I had no drugs! Suddenly I got concerned that I would be locked in this closet for a long time. Someone told me it could take up to three hours. THREE HOURS?! I had two more schools to get to! Do I call and cancel them? The students told me I should make a break for it. There was an exit door only a few steps from our closet. If I ran, no one would see me. Though they said there were security cameras everywhere, but apparently no one watches them. I couldn’t run. I didn’t want to die or be chased by a K-9 unit. We’ve already discovered that running is not my forte.

Two weeks ago I met an admissions rep in NY who accidently went to the wrong school for a visit. He was at the middle school, not the high school. As he was headed out of the building to leave, the school went into a lockdown. This time for three hours. He had left his book, which he always carried, in the car. Nothing to read. Nothing to do. He had to call all his schools the rest of the day and cancel them. Was this my fate?! I always bring my phone into schools now. If nothing else, I can g-chat people till I talk their ears (eyes?) off. Sometimes I contemplate leaving it in the car, but now I think back to my NY friend and always bring it, just in case.

I riffled through my bag. I knew my cell was in there, but in my adrenalin filled rush, I couldn’t find anything. What good is a cell phone if you can’t have it with you when you die?! Suddenly someone pounded on the door and slammed on the door handle. I jumped, as I was six inches from the door. A student reassured me they were just checking to see if the door was locked for the procedure. I guess last week they slammed the door handle so hard it broke off the handle. Great.

The students decided they really liked my job and asked how they could be me. We had a fun chat for 30 minutes or so and overall I think I left a good impression. I told them stories of other schools I’d been to. Crazy things that had happened on the road. I told them being in a lock down was NOT a part of my job description and that this had never happened before. They told me I should buy a shirt at the school store on the way out. I Survived Lock Down at --- High School. Finally after a half an hour, the lock down ended and we were released. I booked it out the door to Guidance to drop off papers and say goodbye. I joked, light heartedly, that I needed to get out before I got locked in again. I said it had been my first real lock down ever but hey, we got to talk a lot about U-! Then the counselors sternly told me I wasn’t supposed to talk during a lockdown. OOPS. Why aren’t the rules posted?!