The Fire Drill

When I was a young kid, our town had a “Fire Safety Week”, so my mom thought it would be a good idea to run a fire drill in our own home to learn an escape plan in case of an emergency.

From my bedroom, my best route outside was down the staircase and out the front door. At our house, though, the front door was mainly ornamental. We always entered and exited through one of the side doors, so the front door actually stayed double latched.

For the drill, my parents sounded a fake alarm. I ran down the stairs to the door. Seconds were of the essence in this hypothetical scenario, but I struggled with the locks and couldn’t get the door open. When I didn’t arrive at the the designated meeting area out front, my parents came to look for me as I still tried to get the door open.

My mom showed me how to open the door, but when she put it to me to replicate what she had done, I still couldn’t figure out how to unlock it on my own. After a couple more of my failed attempts, she said, “I’m sure in a real emergency you’d figure out how to open it.”

Yeah, good drill. HOW AM I EVEN STILL ALIVE?