The Locked Door

The Locked Door

I like to put the blame on Rachel. I mean, she was already four years old. It’s not like she was just a baby. This position may not score points with the committee reviewing one’s credentials for possible admittance into the “Father’s Hall of Fame”, but I think it’s good to assess culpability where it rightfully belongs. It’s never too early to teach your kid a little personal responsibility. 

I don’t see how any of this is my fault. In the first place, it was obvious that we needed a larger structure to store our fishing poles, tackle boxes and life jackets. The old outhouse that we found on the property when we bought it was woefully inadequate, even though it was a two-seater. It had a certain charm to it, but I felt that revisiting images from its previous function every time I grabbed a fishing pole was unsettling and unnecessary. So, the impetus for the entire unfortunate event was completely reasonable. 

It is also significant to note that neither my wife nor Rachel herself made any contribution to the design, size, location or construction of the storage shed. Despite my repeated telling of the story of the little chicken who didn’t help make the bread, they were both idling away their time while I alone had to handle the entire project. Had they participated in the effort, either one of them could have insisted on the inclusion of an escape hatch. I think that you can begin to see that this was not my fault.

Now, I don’t like to point fingers, but the guy who put the door in the storage shed also bears some responsibility. How was I to know that he would install a doorknob with a locking mechanism? I’ve opened a lot of doors in my life, and not all of them locked. I’m sure you have experienced the same. Obviously, any suggestion that I should have known the damn door could lock is blatantly unfair.

The storage shed, also occasionally, albeit incorrectly, dubbed the “boathouse”, had just been completed, and the fishing equipment had not even been moved from the outhouse to its new home. It is significant to note that I, as the primary architect and project manager, had not yet declared the stricture open for occupancy. That would certainly carry substantial weight in the eyes of the law.

I was out in the yard hard at work raking leaves while my wife was engaged in the easy, and relatively meaningless task of gingerly sweeping a few tiny grass clippings off of the backyard patio. Rachel was with me, and even though she was in possession of a small plastic rake, her contribution to the task was minimal, actually negligible. Her entire focus was on the size of the leaf pile as she impatiently waited for it to get big enough for her to jump in. 

We were shocked to see a Sheriff’s vehicle spitting up dust and gravel as it sped up our driveway. Needless to say, I was curious.

“Can I help you, officer?”

“We got a 9-1-1 call from this address.”

“What?! No one here called 9-1-1.”

“We got a call from a child.” At this point he looked down at a small piece of paper. “Her name was Rachel.”

Oh, my God. Rachel called 9-1-1?! How could this be? She was standing ten feet away from me. I immediately wondered what the Deputy Sheriff was thinking in terms of Rachel’s motivation for placing the call. I was tempted to point out to him that she appeared to be healthy and bore no visible signs of physical abuse. 

The Deputy Sheriff added, “And the 9-1-1 operator said she was quite rude.”

Oh, my God. Now we have rudeness added to an unnecessary 9-1-1 call. Fortunately, my wife spoke up.

“Rachel! Did you call 9-1-1?”

I think it was the “rude” comment, and not so much the call itself which prompted Rachel to quickly turn away and pretend to be someplace else. I was trying to come up with a way to join her in the disappearing act of the mind and deferred to my wife’s softer style of interrogation.

“Rachel?”

“What?”

 You have to love it. “What?” What do you think what?

“Did you call 9-1-1?”

“Yes.”

“Why did you do that, honey?” (See, I would have left out the “honey”.)

“I got locked in the boathouse.”

Oh, my God. Rachel got locked in the boathouse, the one that was all my idea, the one I designed, the one I had built. I had never even thought of the possibility of a kid getting locked inside. And she was with me! She had been “helping” me rake leaves. How in God’s name did she end up in the boathouse? I shot a furtive glance in the direction of my wife, and it was immediately clear to me that I would be held to account.

Now, in my defense, Rachel was sneaky. I can only assume that she waited patiently for me to take my eyes off of her for just a split second, and then she bolted for the boathouse. It was a short distance away, and she was fast. Looking back, I’ve come to believe she actually planned the whole thing.

The officer looked in the direction of the boathouse which was just twenty feet from the shoreline. Oh, my God. Now we have an unnecessary 9-1-1 call, a rude kid, and parents who let their little kid wander around unsupervised next to a lake. Mindful of my dad’s frequent admonition that “things could always be worse”, I could only hope that our dog, who had been barking incessantly since the lawman’s arrival, wouldn’t run over and bite him. 

Further in my defense, I need to note that we were in a very shallow area of the lake. The water was only two feet deep for the first fifty feet from shore, and Rachel knew not to go near the water without her mom or dad around. She was also under the impression that the shoreline was inhabited by a number of unusually large, mean and nasty snapping turtles. But I didn’t think the officer would know that. He didn’t. Fortunately, his only reproach was in the form of a good stern look.

Rachel went on to explain that she went into the boathouse and closed the door behind her. When she tried to leave, she discovered the door was locked. Again, this would be a result of the total lack of communication of critical information from the door installer guy, and not my fault. She yelled and pounded on the locked door, but she couldn’t get our attention. This was obviously a feeble effort on Rachel’s part which only adds to her responsibility quotient for the entire affair. Apparently, after giving it a good twenty to thirty seconds, she deemed her situation an emergency and called 9-1-1 on a phone line I had put in the boathouse. Applying her keen sense of intuitive thinking which runs rampant through her father’s bloodline, she figured out how to unlock the door, left the boathouse, and joined us in the yard, failing see any need to mention the call for help. 

We were fortunate that the officer had children of his own and understood how such a thing could happen. After he left, we held a family tutorial on how to lock and unlock the door to the storage shed, followed by a brief discussion on the topic of making 9-1-1 calls. I was (unfairly) singled out in a brief lecture from my wife on the need to maintain constant vigilance over small children.

Now, I think it is plain to see that none of this was my fault. I also point out that I had the misfortune of having Rachel be the kid that got locked in the storage shed. Had it been my boy, none of this would have happened. When he was little, he said if anything bad happened, he’d call 9-9-1. Great, I’d be lying on the kitchen floor having the big one, and my kid would be calling 9-9-1. At least we wouldn’t be having the sheriff show up for no reason.