Never a Dull Moment
Last night, Audrey were already in bed early. Probably 11pm. Sometime around the witching hour I get woken by loud banging on our door. Still groggy, I crack my eyes open to see our room flooded with flashing red lights.
“Uh oh,” I think. “Something ain’t right.”
Sure enough, I stand at the window in my boxers and see what appears to be our whole house surrounded by fire trucks. Oh boy.
“Audrey, wake up! Get your clothes on!”
I throw on some jeans and a t-shirt and run downstairs. The following thoughts ran through my mind:
- my wife gets dressed hella slowly, even in an emergency
- I’m glad they made me buy that home insurance
- funny, I don’t feel that warm in here
- wouldn’t it be wild if flames started coming out my closet
- if our house burns down, we’ll move to India
- that’s not so bad. could be worse.
So while I’m outside checking out my neighbor’s house on fire and smoking something fierce and the firemen putting it out and the campfire smell when there isn’t a campfire and the cold, damp night, I think, dang we’re lucky it’s been put out.
As one of the firemen are walking past back to his truck I say, “boy it’s great you guys came so quick.”
He laughs knowingly. “Yeah, we’re the ones who will always come. We always come when you call.”
I smiled and almost asked him if he read my blog last week.
Tags: adventures, fire, home, philly
May 12th, 2008 at 9:08 pm
holy crap - i am glad you guys are ok! is your house ok? what the heck is going on down there?
May 12th, 2008 at 9:34 pm
LOL - I know, for realz.
May 13th, 2008 at 5:13 am
Man, never a dull moment is right. Wow…I laughed about the pace at which Audrey got dressed…I’ve had a parallel experience and am surprised at emergency response variations among people. Sorry to hear about the drama, but this article was top notch. Glad you’re house is okay.
May 13th, 2008 at 5:24 am
This totally happened to our neighbor on Super Bowl Sunday 2007. We had a party raging when suddenly emergency vehicles start driving down our street the wrong direction. It almost interrupted Prince’s halftime show!
More importantly, did your house survive the recent storm? It was one like that that messed up our roof and taught us the ‘true meaning’ of home ownership.
May 13th, 2008 at 7:43 am
I feel the need to defend the speed of my dressing in an emergency. you see, mark was more convinced it was an emergency than I was. I think he may have even imagined someone pounding on our door. I was like “man, why are you running out the door? everything is fine.” turns out - everything was fine. silly man.
May 13th, 2008 at 8:53 am
Haha! Yeah, I might have been overreacting, but we were both fast asleep so it’s hard to say whether it’s an emergency or not. I was seriously ready to see flames leaping from the neighbor’s window.
May 13th, 2008 at 9:31 am
Wow. I’m glad you guys are ok. It’s just been one non-stop adventure in your new place, hasn’t it!
Audrey - I get dressed slowly as well. It’s ok.
May 13th, 2008 at 11:07 am
glad eveyone is ok. it’s handy to have a fire station 100′ away! they always come, they can walk.
May 18th, 2008 at 11:50 am
I love your attitude- such a Schoneveld! Your in-the-moment thought process shines a little light on your upbringing… It’s just like, “Wow! Nuts! Oh well, what will be will be. If I lose all my stuff, at least I’m more free in that sense! Hmm, India sounds good…” I can’t wait to be back east with you guys