Jailbreak!

Acts of God can bring out the worst in anybody. At least, that’s what I try to keep in mind when I think of my 12-year-old stepdaugther’s principal shouting and chasing after me outside the school yesterday.

Let me explain.

Perhaps you heard about the severe weather that rolled through Tennessee yesterday. It was bad. Really bad. People were killed. Homes were leveled. Cars were overturned. The TV meteorologists stayed on the air all day long, pointing out the storms on the map and telling us where they were headed next. And we were lucky; Every storm cell missed my neighborhood by miles. While people ten miles away were getting 100 mph winds, it was perfectly calm here in my little suburb. But the television and radio coverage was unnerving and you could tell that people were spooked. The roads were nearly empty. Those who had ventured out had cell phones glued to their ears and worried looks on their faces. I made a supermarket run and the bag boy followed me to my car so that he could take my cart back inside when I was done with it.

I chuckled inwardly at the hysteria in a neighborhood that by all accounts was not in the path of an oncoming tornado. I chose not to remember the time last year that I watched MSNBC coverage of a hurricane three states away and grew so nervous that I bolted for the grocery and bought three gallons of milk, “just in case.” I was older and wiser now and I wasn’t going to run around like an idiot any more.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case at the middle school.

As I pulled in to the parking lot to pick up 12, I congratulated myself on both buying groceries and getting to the school before a single drop of rain had fallen and before a single child had left the building. I listened to the meteorologists on the radio and I waited. And I waited and waited and waited.

A teacher came outside and shouted something at one of the parents in the parking lot. Then she shook her head and made a swirling motion in the air with her finger.

Oh no. A lockdown! I bolted from the car to bust out my stepdaughter.

As I ran into the front office, the principal burst out of his inner chamber, pumping the air with his fists. “No one leaves this building!” he shouted. “People can come in, but once they’re inside, they can’t leave!”

“What about the parents in the parking lot?” a secretary squeaked.

“Bring them in and put them in the cafeteria,” he boomed. I could almost see the giant spotlight he was clearly imagining to be focused on his bad self. I quickly realized there would be no bargaining with the big guy. Cleverly, I waited until he left the room before turning to the secretaries.

“I need my stepdaughter,” I wheedled. “I need her now.”

“Um. No one can leave the building,” one of the secretaries said softly.

For the first time, I started to panic a little bit. “I have a 15-year-old and a two-year-old at home alone. I need to go back to them and I need to have 12 with me,” I said calmly.

They stood, mothers themselves, paralyzed by my compelling argument. The assistant principal came in the room. Thank God. I knew her well. She had been both of the girls’ fifth grade teacher.

“She’s in Mrs. Thompson’s room,” she said. “Go get her. I’ll explain to Mr. Farnsworth later.”

I ran down the hall, furtively keeping an eye out for the principal. I found 12 and breathlessly told her to get her things together. Grabbing her wrist, we trotted together toward a side door. She looked at me a little strangely, but the truth is, she’s learned to expect the unexpected with me. Once outside, we headed for the car.

“Stop RIGHT THERE!!” I heard the principal shout in a menacing voice. I turned and saw him standing about 50 feet away outside another door. Out of the corner of my eye, I calculated the distance between us and the car and decided there was no way he could catch us. I faced him defiantly.

“We’re LEAVING!” I screamed. “I have two children at home ALONE!” He kept walking toward us. I bent my knees a little, ready for a showdown. “Ms. Gilliam said we could go!”

He stopped short. Ms. Gilliam? The assistant principal? I could see the bureaucratic gears turning in his head. Yes, she definitely had the authority to let us go… Defeatedly, he waved his hand at us and we scampered away.

“Whew! I’m glad he didn’t try to stop us,” I told 12 once we were in the car. “Because if he had kept coming toward us, I was just going to say ‘RUN!’ and make a break for it!”

12 laughed. “You make it all so dramatic!” she said. “I mean, most people would’ve just like come in and tried to get their kid. But you were like, running and yelling and stuff.” We kept laughing all the way home, particularly when we passed our preacher on the road, headed in the other direction. “When you see your preacher before a storm,” I intoned, “It is either a good sign or a very, very bad sign.”

I’m pretty sure I am going to be the cause of an intensive staff meeting on the meaning of the word “lockdown” at the middle school, but to hell with it. I had my family with me yesterday afternoon when the storms rolled through and that was all that mattered.