i'm a little neurotic about parking in the shade, and last friday morning was no different.
i pulled into the parking lot of The Boy's preschool at 9:00am and found a shady spot.
it was already getting warm, and was to be ninety degrees before long.
as i pulled in, the gardeners did also, and one promptly jumped out of the truck, strapped on his blower and turned it on.
The Boy wanted to get out of my side of the vehicle, from the same door i use to remove The Baby, but since the blower guy was right next to me i told Boy to wait in his seat. he was still buckled in.
"WHY?" he hollered over the noise.
"BECAUSE OF ALL THE NOISE AND BLOWING LEAVES! I'LL COME AROUND TO YOUR SIDE WITH THE BABY!"
"WHAT?" he could hardly hear me over all the noise.
perhaps also because of the noise, i never heard the doors lock as i sat on the keys after they fell out of my back pocket and onto the seat as i was removing said Baby.
i did notice the doors were locked after i shut them.
i hustled over to his darkly tinted window to try to mime to him, with my face pressed to the glass, that i would be right back while i ran inside to tell the site supervisor to get me help, but he couldn't hear me or understand what was going on.
the site supervisor called the campus police. the college campus, to which the preschool belongs, is several blocks away from the preschool.
after i had stood with Baby in arms, my face pressed to the glass, being covered in leaves and dirt by the goddamn blowing device, trying to communicate with The Boy for several minutes, the site supervisor came to say that the campus police have no way to open the car, and they were calling the fire department.
five minutes later, the fire department still wasn't there.
the blower was still blowing all around me.
the baby was crying in my arms.
The Boy looked scared and confused.
it was getting warmer outside.
i told the gardener my child was locked in the car and i couldn't leave his side and that my baby and i were getting covered in dirt and leaves and that we were all scared of the noise.
he told me he was just doing his job.
i called my friend and asked her to go to my house to get the extra key. i thought this would certainly get the fire department there faster.
but they still didn't come. the blower still didn't stop. we called the campus police again.
they had dispatched the fire department to the main campus, not the preschool campus.
five more minutes, and they arrived.
five firemen descended upon the volvo with various tools and got to work.
they wedged the doors ajar and stuck in a wire to depress the lock button.
but it wouldn't pop up.
they slim-jimmed every door.
but none would open.
i told them to break the glass.
but one of them fashioned a pincher and sent it through a wedged-open door, pinched the lock plunger, pulled it up and opened the front door. he then depressed the unlock button, but it still wouldn't unlock.
i still couldn't get to The Boy. five huge firemen were fiddling with the button, blocking me from diving through to grab him.
one of them finally reached around, got the keys off the seat and unlocked the fecking doors.
then my friend showed up with the key.
The Boy was locked in there for thirty minutes.
he clung to me with arms and legs for another thirty minutes.
the whole class of kids ended up coming out to take a tour of the fire truck.
i've had a headache ever since.
