Officer

Always nice to meet local emergency personnel.  (Not in any of the ways I'm going to describe.)

In my first house, I met the fire department when we had lived there less than 3 years.  Smoke detectors went off.  I called the non-emergency number to ask if they might be malfunctioning.  They said, probably.  They would have to come check.  FYI "come check" means full lights, sirens and various emergency vehicles.  When you have two firetrucks, an ambulance and a police car parked outside your house, you will get to meet all the neighbors in the neighborhood. 

Second house, I was 8 months pregnant with Jo.  Sam was not yet diagnosed, but so way on the autism spectrum.  He had taken the separated laundry and thrown it from one end of my bedroom to the other.  Then he pulled all the books off my bookshelf and dumped my dresser drawers.  I decided we needed to get out.  At some point, I must have opened but not closed the front door.  When I got home, it was wide open.  In my pregnancy fog, I couldn't remember if I had tried to turn on the alarms, etc.  I called to see if there was an alarm tripped and explained why.  Guess what?  They send the police to your house for that too!  The officer and I were chatting about this and that walking through the house to make sure it was clear.  Then he opened the door to my bedroom.  He threw his arm out to "protect" me and reached for his gun.  Kind of embarrassing to have to explain, "Uh, no.  It's not ransacked.  That's pretty much how I left it this morning." 

Third house, Sam scaled a six foot privacy fence with a slide bolt and padlock.  Got to meet the police AND find out that our county has a search and rescue helicopter ready for just such an occasion.  Who knew?

Brings me to my current house.  Message on my answering machine a few weeks ago looking for somebody who shares my name.  I ignored the first message on the machine.  After the second, I called back to say right name, wrong person.  One more message, then a call when I was home and I picked up.  I explained I was not who they were looking for.  Please stop calling.  I assumed the person was an employee of the facility they were calling from.  Judging from the letter I just received that was sent to a previous address of mine, I'm guessing they are not an employee, but a "client."  This is why I will no longer be returning phone calls mistakenly left on my answering machine. 

Officer Z showed up.  I think he could tell I was a little freaked.  He took some information and left.  Then he called about 15 minutes later to say he tried to get information tonight, but couldn't.  He would call the facility tomorrow and then call me.  Still a little freaked, but glad he took it seriously. 

Thanks for the quick response Officer Z.