This is a Story Where Nothing Happened

My 10-month-old baby was locked in a car in a Target parking lot on a hot June afternoon.

Now that I have your attention, I’ll also tell you: He turns 17 in a few weeks, and this was hardly the worst thing that ever happened to him.

I don’t mean to make light of what is, of course, a serious and tragic thing that happens to real people whose stories don’t end well. I hate those stories, and so do you.

This is a story where nothing happened. Drama addicts and assorted others who need to feel something or judge somebody, this may not be exciting enough for you.

You want to to know why nothing happened? Easy: The problem got solved, then everyone went home. Totally anticlimactic, I know.

It’s just a theory, but, 17 years ago, there were no gawkers capturing smartphone video to upload to the local TV station. No vigilante social media justice. No online mommy mafia. In fact, I don’t think I’d ever heard a story about a baby in a hot car before I saw mine sitting there, looking at me from the other side of the glass.

That day, there was no judging or speculating on how I could be that stupid, how I didn’t deserve to have kids, or how I should roast to death in a hot car to atone.

I remember what he wore, but not how long he was in the car.

It was me and a couple of mall cops trying to decide if we could slim jim the door or if we’d have to break the window. Someone offered a wire hanger. And there was a guy who let me borrow his cell phone, since mine was locked in the car, along with my baby, dressed in an orange striped Hanna Andersson tank, strapped in his car seat, clutching the keys in one hand, and his drink in the other. The drink that would keep him hydrated while we figured this out.

Wire hanger or broken window. Pick one.

The wire hanger was the winner. Door opened after many frustrating tries to move the lock toggle, I turned the car on, opened windows, blasted the AC, gave the baby a quick once-over. I was quietly relieved that we did this without breaking glass, especially since I didn’t have anything that would’ve broken the glass any faster than the twisted hanger opened the door.

Nothing to see here, move along. I thanked the people who stopped to help, and then my son and I went home.

I never told anyone what happened that day. The drama unfolded, then it rolled back up. Honestly, I couldn’t even tell you how long the whole scene lasted; when it was happening, it felt like forever. It was probably more like 20 minutes of kid-in-a-hot-car suspense. But later, at home, I couldn’t sort out in my mind how to even tell the story to anyone. So I didn’t.

If this would have happened in 2016, my kid and I would have been national news. We would have been trending on social. There would probably be smartphone video of me, angrily telling looky loos to fuck off, which would be bleeped out for the segment on First Edition, and the ladies on The View would dissect me for a good 10 minutes before Whoopi decides it’s time to move on.

None of it would be the least bit constructive. But everyone would feel better.

I can’t help you feel better, but I’ll offer something constructive for if you ever lock your own baby in the car. I’m sure it’ll never happen to you, since y’all are great parents and always on top of everything, but never say never, right?

1. Grab a stranger — two heads are greater than one. Neither one of you knows what to do, and that’s awkward, but there’s a baby in a hot car, so this person isn’t going to just walk away.
2. Mall cops are no more or less helpful than anyone else. The particular mall cops who helped me didn’t have a slim jim and knew less about breaking into cars than I did.
3. Locksmiths advertise that they’ll unlock a car with a kid inside for free. That’s nice. But, it’ll be about an hour and a half before they can get someone out to help you.
4. The person in your life with the second set of car keys will be across town in rush-hour traffic.
5. Which brings us back to the stranger and the mall cops: They’re your best bet.

You may be crowing that you know 100% that you would never leave your kid in a car … I read these exact words in a mommy mafia Facebook thread about kids left in cars just this morning.

And it wasn’t just one person. It was a whole thread of people, all with a variation on the same assertion.

“What kind of mom could …? I would never …! What is wrong with that mom…? SO HORRIBLE”

So many mommies, so 100 percent sure this would never happen to them. (and yeah, someone actually said “100% sure”), because they are ON IT so perfectly; never distracted, never in a hurry, never a brain fart. Never, ever. And don’t you dare suggest otherwise.

“Beware of saying, ‘I would never…’”

I jumped into the comments with those six words. It’s all I said. I deliberately didn’t finish the sentence; I didn’t want to attack anyone, it was a simple reminder that sometimes, life has other ideas. The mommy mafia disagreed: I got jumped pretty hard for the suggestion. I’d share the comments here, but an admin took down the whole conversation.

I’m betting that I’m the only one of them who actually had a kid locked in a hot car once.

© Susan Sheffloe Speer, 2016