What are ways to free a toddler from a locked room, Alex?
Our Friday morning almost went entirely differently. Since I’m avoiding all potential protests I decided to take the kids to church on base. (The other church we’ve been attending is in the other direction — toward the red zone.) Not only do I enjoy going to the chapel, but afterward a trip to the base food court makes for an easy lunch. Win.Win.Win.
However, our plans were derailed when I stepped out of the room to ask one of the boys to watch Camille so I could take a shower and the door closed and clicked behind me. I went to open it and it was locked — she had turned the key. These are not base housing doors with locks you can pick with a paperclip. Our doors are solid wood (not hollow pressboard) and each lock has a unique key which works a thick deadbolt. In Oman, I collected all the keys from around the house (there are keys for everything here, including the refrigerator — it’s crazy) and kept them in a drawer so they wouldn’t get lost. It took about an hour to get all 30 something keys back in place before we moved out. The boys collected all the keys from their rooms here, but I had forgotten about the one in my bedroom door. I didn’t know she knew how to turn the key or I would have put her safety over my privacy. I never get any of that anyway.
So now what? I first urged her to turn the key: “Come on baby, turn the key so we can open the door.” I heard several teasing clicks and each time jumped on the handle only to be disappointed. Then we heard her voice getting further away as she gave up and started rummaging around in my drawers. Oh no. There I was, Friday morning, everything closed until after 1pm and we were stuck. The boys gathered around the door trying to troubleshoot the problem. “Call the landlord!” Small problem — our landlord is on vacation, Josh has the backup number to call in case of emergency, but Josh was out of the country. Then I realized that my brain, I mean my phone and my computer, were locked in the room with her. So no phone, no way to google myself a solution, and a toddler who was doing God knows what on the other side of the door.
Carter yelled, “I have an idea!” and ran off. Meanwhile, I coaxed her back to the door saying, “Camille . . . do you want an ice cream bar? Come turn the key for mommy so you can come out and have ice cream.” She obliged and I swear all those clicks should have resulted in an unlocked door, but they didn’t. And then we heard a sound of metal sliding against metal and Calvin said, “Mom, she took the key out!” Our odds of success just went down dramatically.
Then Carter came bounding up the stairs with an axe in his hands, yelling, “Get back!” I stopped him from putting a gash in the door and told him that we should start with the least destructive method first. There were no visible hinges to take the door off, but Carter (I’d be lost without that kid) had the idea to take off the door handle so he ran off to get a screwdriver. After removing the baseplate we were left with the thick brass lock and no way to maneuver around it. Carter went to get the sledgehammer, Caleb started crying, and Calvin wanted to get a running start and bash into the door with his body like a battering ram. There was also talk of trying to scale the palm tree outside the bathroom window, but I convinced them that a broken interior door was much better than a broken window and a broken body from falling 2 stories onto a concrete patio.
Carter came back with the sledgehammer, but before we set upon a path of no return we gave it one more shot — we’d been praying off and on the entire time that God would help us get Camille out and we collectively breathed out one last prayer that God would miraculously help her get the key, put it back in the lock, and turn it the right way so she could get out.
All of us huddled around the doorknob and called, “Camille! Come and unlock the door so you can come out and have ice cream!” Caleb added, “Do you want to watch the Lorax? You can watch it on my ipod as soon as you come out!” We held our breath as we could hear her getting closer to the door and heard some rattling around. “Mama! I can’t!” she cried. “Yes, you can! Just put the key in and keep turning it.” (Our locks are weird and you have to turn, and turn, and turn before you get to where it unlocks.) “Come out and have some ice cream! Try turning it the other way!”
We heard a heavy click and the door flew open as we all fell against it. “Yay, Camille! You did a great job!” we all cheered. She was grinning and happy and eager for her treat. I was exhausted, but so glad the story didn’t end with a splintered door. It really was a miracle that she was able to get the key back in the door the right way to let herself out.
Lessons learned:
1. Remove all the keys (except the one for the refrigerator because although it’s creepy that people lock the fridge to keep their housemaids from stealing food, I love that the lock keeps Camille out. I forgot to lock it the other day and came in to find her and the dog feasting on raw bacon. Yuck.)
2. Stop talking about taking one of our old cell phones and turning it into a house phone — do it. And store some important numbers in there while I’m at it. Like the number to a locksmith. Or a taxi. Or poison control. (brainstorming possible emergencies . . .)
3. Don’t let Carter go off to college. That kid is a problem solver and I need his skills. He already told me he wants to homeschool for college so I think he’ll be OK with that. His future wife might not enjoy sharing a house with me, but we’ll work it out.
PS: We still made it to church — slightly frazzled, but happy.
Returning all the tools
The Lorax and ice cream, as promised.
