On a day much like any other day in April, the 20th to be exact, I dropped off the kids at the preschool, swung the car around to the faculty parking lot and hiked up the stairway to my office to prepare for my first class. I taught my classes, ate a quick lunch, and headed out to my 1 p.m. physical therapy appointment. 

I remember laughing heartily with my therapist about something or other, completing my repetitions, and heading out the door and down the street back to the college. 

As I cleared the light at Soscol and Imola, I steered my car into the right lane so that I could pull in the college via Streblow, but before I could advance enough, I saw a policeman standing near the college’s grapevines. He was waving me away. This did not compute to me. I looked around quickly and saw orange cones blocking the street and a couple of police cars were parked askew right in front.

“What the…?” I wondered as I pulled sharply to the right into the dusty shoulder by the grapevines. I didn’t care that the policeman was still gesticulating at me to get back on the road and move on. My kids were inside that college!

I ambled out of my car and walked alongside of it in order to reach the policeman and ask him what the hell was going on. “Excuse me,” I said, “Why is the entrance blocked?” 

His answer was short and professional; “I don’t know Ma’am, but you need to get back in the car and leave.”

“Look, my kids are inside of there! I need to get in to pick them up!” I could feel the Lioness mother rising in me.

“You can’t get in, Ma’am. All entrances are blocked.”

“Yes, I know,” I said, starting to get a bit frantic, “but MY KIDS ARE IN THERE.” Do you know when they’ll open the entrance up again?”

“No Ma’am. This college is closed until further notice.”

I wanted to respond, but upon assessing the situation, I knew we’d play a game of Who’s on First and I would get nowhere with this guy. I climbed back into my Subaru and tried to think quickly. I double-backed around and parked into the Target center across from the college as I simultaneously reached in my purse for my ordinary cellphone.

“Gina, how come I can’t get inside the college?” The faculty secretary excitedly filled me in that the college was on lockdown and that everyone, no exceptions, had been told to stay wherever they were because one or two armed men had entered the campus after robbing someone across the street, where I was now.

I was dumbfounded. I was unsure of what to do at this point. Neither the policeman nor Gina could tell me how long this nightmare would last. I couldn’t get in the college, I couldn’t get my kids ... I felt useless.

I decided to drive home and see if I could find out exactly what was happening. As I was driving home, I left a quick message on my husband’s phone and I tried to keep my voice even. I refused to give in to panic, but I had to squelch it down.

I summoned up the Napa Valley Register on my computer at home and was relieved but worried anew as I saw that their reporters were updating information as it came in. One part of the updates caught my eye; apparently a SWAT unit was around the library and around the winery classrooms. The winery classroom was RIGHT NEXT to the Child Development Center where my kids were, and I had no idea how they were or what was going on! I forcibly pushed violent images from my imagination and tried to stay focused.

It was then that I noticed that our president, Chris McCarthy, was also updating us via e-mail along with our campus police and a handful of others. Without thinking, I immediately replied to Chris’s e-mail and asked if he knew more information — specifically about the Child Development Center. 

To my surprise and gratitude, he immediately replied back and let me know that the kids were happily playing, the window shades of the classrooms were drawn and the staff was preparing to move all the children — from infants to toddlers like mine — off campus and to the local fire station behind Target. He told me that the kids were in no immediate danger but that the decision had been made to remove the children as a precaution.

Meanwhile I had called the faculty secretaries, Gina and Christine, again and found out that, in fact, I was in the best position as I was not trapped in the college (by luck of having gone to physical therapy) and that I would soon be reunited with my kids. I heard awful stories of faculty and students trapped in classrooms without food, water, and desperate to use the restrooms. Others were making the best of the situation by gathering together in meeting rooms and chatting as they waited it out.

As I was awaiting word of when I could meet my kids at the fire station, my e-mail told me that some of my former students were making real-time updates to Facebook and were even posting pictures of their trapped selves. The real action, it turned out, was happening outside and within the library. One of the suspects had given up rather quickly, but another one was still in the library, trying to pass himself off as a student. Apparently he offered $500 to other students to help him get out of the library and give him a ride to Vallejo to “pick up his girlfriend who needed him.” 

Everyone in the library, students and staff included, knew that this man was older and clearly not a student. I heard the fearless librarian pretty much ordered the man to get out, and he eventually did.

The e-mail from Chris, my president, came and informed me that the kids were on their way to the fire station and knew nothing more than they were going on an adventure on a yellow school bus. I rushed over to the station to see if I could help.

A few children were already set up with cups of juice and snacks and were playing on the floor while the firemen and women and staff were graciously and wonderfully amusing/distracting them with tours of the fire station and the engines themselves. When my son came, I knew he’d be so excited to see his favorite — fire engines!!

I helped carry a few infants and toddlers from vans and buses into the station and helped the teachers and staff get ready to be besieged with worried parents. Always the professionals, the staff and teachers of the Child Development Center were following strict protocol and brought each class’s sign-in and -out sheets to make sure someone was authorized to pick up each child and that no child in their care would leave with someone not on a previous list. I was so impressed by this as well as by the college president, the fire station personnel, the Napa Register for their timely updates, and everyone who worked at the college.

Finally the yellow bus with my kids arrived. My son’s brown eyes were wide with excitement and adventure. My daughter was crying, but I quickly found out this was that she didn’t like the bus driver for some reason, which is definitely one of my daughter’s personality quirks.

I made sure the kids got a look around at the shiny fire trucks before we left and that the staff didn’t need more help from me. At this point, however, the station was filled to capacity and the more parents and children that could leave, the better, so we went home and talked about our “adventure.”

I was to learn later that while I was with my kids, most of the people on campus had had to stay put for at least another two hours before the situation of the robbers was handled. Students that had children in the Child Development Center had to wait until they could leave campus to come pick up their children at the fire station.

The next day I drove straight to my cellphone provider and bought myself what I had resisted up until that day: a smartphone. Never again would I be left uninformed and a slave to get back to my computer and landline at home to find out what was going on. The first things I programmed into the phone were the AlertU campus application and the Napa Fire department phone alert system.

If there ever is a next time, I plan to be prepared.