hot and cold

we live in a triplex.  well, it's actually a 10 bedroom house that was converted into a triplex.  10 bedrooms may sound like a lot, but let me explain...years ago, the "compound" we live on was a foster care center for girls.  each home supported 8 girls and two adult couples.  when funding for the center ran out, a local inn owner bought the property, closed off a few doors, and converted the homes into triplexes for rent.  we felt pretty lucky to find the place, because the few other choices in borger, tx are pretty gruesome.  it's nothing magical here, but it will serve its purpose for the next several months.

so this past sunday was a typical day.  blake and i made a run to the donut shop for a breakfast treat.  we tried out the local first baptist church. we watched our young neighbors move the last of their furniture out of their side of our triplex.  we played outside in the perfectly gorgeous weather with some of the other neighborhood kids.  we watched a movie during blake's nap.  we had our usual family dinner.  peaceful, calm, normal day.  that night, marcus fell asleep watching tv on the couch, and i finally dozed off into dreamland shortly before midnight, fully expecting to wake up to the morning sun, gleaming through our window like every day.
what i actually woke up to was far less relaxing. FAR LESS. a blaring, full-scale fire alarm was pounding in my ears and marcus was rushing toward me shouting, "get dressed and get blake!"  i sincerely do not think my heart has ever pounded so rapidly or so hard in my entire 32 years.  while marcus fumbled for clothes of his own, i spent two seconds (but what felt like eternity) trying to reason with myself that the crop pants i was staring at inside my drawer would be acceptable wear for the frigid outdoors.  i scrambled into them and ran down the hall to blake's room, with a flashing fire alarm strobe light blinding my already contact-free, blurry eyes.  please do not mistake this fire alarm as a mere smoke detector going off.  remember that we live in a building meant to house 12 people.  so when i say full-scale fire alarm, i mean like the kind you would find in a school building.  full. scale.  i busted through blake's door, expecting to find him wide-eyed and terrified.  nope.  he was asleep. (!)  i scooped him and every blanket from his bed up and over the crib railing with superman strength and bolted for the front door.  marcus was practically stepping on my heels on the way out.  he had been lucid enough to grab my winter coat, but i was in such a state of shock and was gripping the blake-blanket combo so tightly, that i simply just stood there, barefoot, on our patio and trembled, more from adrenaline than anything.  and then marcus turned and went
back.
into.
the.
house.
i honestly started to panic.  WHAT in the world could he have possibly gone in for???  all i could picture was him taking one step down the hall and getting blown away by a gas explosion or something.   i started banging on the front door with my foot, saying out loud, "nothing in there is THAT important!"  but there was no way in a million years he could have heard it over the screaming alarm.  he finally came back out with cell phones, a car key, his wallet, and our landlord's phone number.  (he later told me that the reasoning for his wallet was so that we could pay for a hotel room when our house burned down.)  by this point, blake was shivering.  also by this point, i had gone over a thousand thoughts about what was happening.  could our newly departed neighbors have left something on?  the alarm is triggered by smoke detectors in all three units.  and all three were going off consecutively.  was there an electrical fire hidden in the walls?  was our water heater old and rusted out and combusting things around it?  had i left lint in the dryer trap?  i also was trying to run through the things we had left inside that were likely about to be destroyed.   in all truth, i remember instantly thinking that every single thing is replaceable.  as long as all three of us were out and safe, there is nothing that we couldn't buy again.  except for maybe digital pictures.  but i'd rather have a living baby and husband than photos of memories with them.  so all of these thoughts streamed through my head within about 30 seconds, after which we proceeded to call 911 and our neighbor/landlord, who also happens to be a volunteer firefighter.  when i hung up with the emergency operator, i took blake with me to sit in the car in the driveway, out of the wind chill.  he was as calm as could be.  a little bit bewildered by being woken up more than anything.  the rest of the events i witnessed through the windows of the car. marcus paces about the patio, waiting on our neighbor, jeff.  a disheveled jeff eventually comes scooting across our lawn, immediately goes into the vacant middle unit, and shuts off the alarm.  i am wondering why on earth he is not being more cautious.  then he enters our unit and is inside for a bit.  i can't remember if marcus went inside with him or not, but my imagination is still keeping pace with my pounding heart, and i keep waiting to see flames begin to rise from the roof.  a minute later, marcus comes to the car and says, "jeff said you can call the fire department and tell them not to come."  uhh.
"why? does he know what it is?"
he said, "i think so," and then walked off.  uhhhh.  you THINK so?
i sat there utterly confused and debating what in the world i should do.  i tentatively called 911 again.  same lady.  i told her i didn't really know what was going on or if i should even be calling.  she said, "they're already on their way.  they can come, it's no problem,"  as if they had nothing better to do (i guess that's a small town for you).  while i was still discussing the possibilities with her, i spotted the glow from the fire truck lights approaching our entrance.  and i told her, "they just pulled in, so i guess we'll just let them come."  silly thing to say.  they pulled up to our sidewalk and two men got down and plodded toward the house, fully geared up.  blake was mesmerized by the flashing lights, and despite my scrambled brain, i somehow saw this as a teachable moment (always the instructor).  so i started talking to him about the firemen and their suits and the truck and the lights.  we have a sesame street book that is about a firehouse, so i was trying to reference parts from the story that he would remember.  who knows if he even had a clue what i was talking about.  but it sure did give me something else to focus on besides reality.  the firemen entered the middle unit first and then checked ours out.  i have to admit, i felt a big amount of relief just having the "professionals" there to figure things out.  better safe than sorry.  meanwhile, marcus, jeff, and an unsuited fireman talked on the patio until the two suited men came back out.  the conversation continued and then everyone packed up and left.  just like that.  you would almost say it's a let down of an ending if you didn't know better.  marcus came up to the car and walked back in with us.  the explanation went a little something like this:  the smoke detectors in the units are highly sensitive.  blake has a humidifier in his bedroom, since he's prone to eczema in dry weather and we now live in dustbowl, usa.  the humidifier lets off water vapor "smoke" when it's turned up high enough (which it was).  so the movement of the vapor likely triggered the detector.  the thing is, i had been running the humidifier all night long for a week without problem.  well....the other explanation from jeff was that sometimes cobwebs build up inside the detectors and can set them off if they vibrate.  sure enough, the next day jeff came over to re-set blake's smoke detector and unveiled a lifetime supply of cobwebs.  so a lowly spider bested my entire family and local community servicemen.  and likely took 5 years off of my life in the process.  well played, arachnid.
so here's the best part of the story, in my opinion.  while blake went right back to sleep without a second thought, marcus and i were obviously shaken.  while marc never fully went back to sleep at all, i managed to lie in bed until past 3, running over the night's events and what-if scenarios in my head.  and in the midst of these rambling thoughts, i suddenly remembered what our sermon had been about that morning.......fire.  more specifically, God is an all-consuming fire.  the pastor had spent an entire 40 minutes talking about starting fires, catching on fire, and being a part of the fire.  he even brought up that old 70's classic "pass it on,"  where the lyrics say, "it only takes a spark to get a fire going."  and as i lay there, trying to quench the fiery thoughts that wouldn't leave my weary brain, it seemed to ring as loud as the alarm that started it all.  seems a little drastic, God, but wow................message received.