October 26 – “A Crisis Averted”

You might have noticed no mention of The Brothers in the last post.  Zak and Caleb had been invited to spend the day with friends from the church, so they had already been to the zoo and had eaten a good supper when it finally became their turn to meet their little brother.  Knowing that their visit was impending, I hurried out to the car and returned with the little crocheted (or knitted or whatever that’s called) and stuffed light sabre that Anne made for him.  I wanted him to have it when The Brothers arrived.  Protection, you know?  We got a few pictures of his earliest Jedi moves and texted one off to Anne. 

Finally word came that Zak and Caleb were in the parking lot, so I joined Josh and Brittany (a friend from South Oaks who now lives just down the road in Temple who was leaving) to greet them.  Just as we entered the lobby, though, alarms went off.  We found out later that someone had triggered the security alarm at almost the exact time we had exited the secure unit.  Hmm.  I don’t remember getting that close.  And we didn’t have Luke with us, so it couldn’t have been us.  I do remember passing a kid about 10 years old or so who was standing right by the security keypad.  Not blaming him or anything, but if I was 10 and an unguarded pad of buttons was hanging right there on the wall just waiting to be pushed, well … 

We did our best to ignore the high-pitched noise filling the air, said goodbye to Brittany and walked to the front doors.  They were the automatic, slide open whenever some approaches variety.  Except they didn’t automatically slide open.  No, I didn’t walk right into them and smash my face, but I suppose that would have been pretty funny.  I did back up and try again a time or two, and I noticed a counterpart on the outside trying the same thing.  Nothing.  Locked shut.  I tried to pry them apart manually, since the sign on them said to open manually in case of emergency, but apparently this didn’t qualify as an emergency.  I was glad Chris wasn’t around, because the idea of being trapped inside any enclosed space brings about near panic attacks in her.  As the crowds began to grow on both sides, the receptionist responded to questioning looks with a perplexed look of her own.  She had already pushed every button she knew to push, and now she was doomed to wait with the rest of us for security to arrive.  And the alarms continued.

In the midst of the crisis, Zak and Caleb and their host for the day, Sarah, arrived bearing a birthday cake and some special cards they had made to welcome the new brother to the fold.  They grinned and waved excitedly when they saw us, and we responded in kind, but only a taste of the mass confusion greeted them as they approached the door.  By this time Josh had made a decision to investigate a secondary exit possibility.  He disappeared down a back hallway, and after a long several minutes, there he was, hugging the boys and no doubt reassuring them that baby brother was doing fine.  He took Caleb in his arms and Zak by the hand, and the four of them began the trek around to the back of the hospital and the secret entrance Josh had uncovered.  And the alarms continued.

Meanwhile, custodians arrived and tried their hand at solving the dilemma.  Brute force didn’t seem to do any good, so they reverted to a more cerebral approach.  They turned the automatic feature of the door off and tried again.  This time the inner door swung open and one of them raced to the outside door to try the same thing.  Success.  The old guy who had been my counterpart managed to get inside the building.  Others were more hesitant, preferring instead to watch the proceedings from the relative safety of an escape route to their car.  The custodians continued working until, with one outside the building and one in the breezeway between worlds, the doors decided to lock up tight once again.  At that point it became evident that they were just as confused as everyone else.  I offered to do whatever it was that they had done to make it work the first time, and he happily agreed to let me try.  Alas, however, the doors refused to budge.  And the alarms continued.

Finally, the lone security guard on duty in the building arrived, making his usual rounds.  Seems the alarm had been confined to this particular lobby, and he never heard a thing wherever it was that he had been.  He quickly explained that doors were not going to operate in any way until he entered the code to turn off the ever-sounding alarm.  Before anyone could sarcastically encourage him to do just that (Not that I would have actually said anything, mind you), he hurried over to the very punch-pad that the youngster had been loitering near and tapped in his master code.  And mercifully, the alarms stopped.  The trapped custodians backed away from their respective doors, which then opened as usual to let them back in, as if nothing out of the ordinary had ever occurred. 

Within seconds Josh and the boys arrived from the rear, having heroically made their way through the hazards of the back of the hospital.  As thrilled as they were to see me, they were more than ready to meet their new Brother.  We ushered them into the room and both of them rushed over to Christi and Luke, gently caressing his face and tapping his little body.  They greeted him warmly and hugged their Mommy and presented him with the birthday cake they had helped make and the cards they had worked so hard on.  Later one, when Caleb he finally got some one-on-one time with his baby brother, he gently said in his very best, brand new big brother voice, “Hi, Luke.  I love you.  Are you all better?”  Oh, and in the interest of fairness, I have to include a quotation from Zakary as well.  He was quieter in the hospital room, though none the less gentle and loving.  But he did come up with a zinger later on, after we had returned to the house for the evening and were preparing for bed.  Chris was in Nani mode, encouraging them to get pajamas on and the like.  At one point Zak passed me in the hall.  With a conspiratorial grin he glanced from side to side and whispered to me, “I don’t have to brush my teeth because there is no one here to tell me to do it.”  I sure admired his spunk.  But guess how that played out with Nani?

Psalms 118:17 says, “I will not die but live, and will proclaim what the Lord has done.”

Father, I do indeed proclaim that you have done some great and mighty things.  But this week, thank you for the tiny and helpless things as well.  Amen.