Wait, what?...Emergency?

At about 2:15 AM, the fire alarm went off. I did not panic. I did not move. I must have been in my house about ten minutes doing a stand off with the noise before I found my matching track suit, used the restroom, and then went outside.

I passed the stairwell exit right outside of my door to wait it out a few more seconds for confirmation from other "alarmed" neighbors...the halls were bare. I walked further down the hall and peered out the windows outside the elevator doors; they spoke of no frightened residents running across streets, so I moved slowly, the droning still going hard in my ears.

I finally saw others when I reached the fifth floor; their faces signaled that they too had waited it out with me, hoping to avoid the dreadful walk downstairs and outside, mid-sleep.

I didn't want to be a party caught out there by a "false alarm", but I definitely didn't want to be a person wishing that I'd heeded the warning. 11 flights of stairs later I was joined outside by far less people than there are actual residents. We found places to be seated right alongside the "could-be-burning" building and just waited for the noise to stop. No neighborly chit-chatting. We mean mugged and waited for the word to go back inside.

There was one dad who clearly took his cue from the airplane safety handbook; while he was fully clad in his glasses, shorts, t-shirt and flip flops, the pitter patter of little feet slapping against the sidewalk indicated that there was apparently no time for his six-year old twins to get dressed also. But, who am I to judge, my two kids were still inside.

While I waited, seated on a cement slab outside the bank adjacent to my thankfully not burning building, I contemplated the blessings, and the lessons: 1) thank God there are signs of people going inside now, indicating no true cause for alarm, but 2) who am I in the face of danger?

When I walked back into my room, the television was still tuned to the cooking channel that I had originally fallen asleep on. I kid you not, before I could even replace my running gear with pajamas, one of the chefs on Chopped yelled, "fire"; I stared at her burning pan on the stove. Less than two seconds later, the show was interrupted by the screeching noise made when the tv gets interrupted by the "test of the emergency broadcast system".

Hmmmmmm, okay, God.

Tonight, I was a Brooklyn girl, casting off the late night warning as no REAL danger. I like that I wasn't afraid, but I can stand to be better prepared.

To Do List:
Establish my official alarm response plan (including the evacuation of myself AND my cats) Just In Case!


Thanks God for safety!
#idonttakemylifeforgranted

Now...for the difficult task of falling back to sleep.