NEVER TOO SAFE!

Up until now, the pink building was all I knew about school. Both my pre k and my kindergarten years were spent there. But sometime after Christmas, my teachers stopped our playtime at recess every day to point to the huge building on the other side of our schoolyard to tell us that very soon, we would be going to that building for school. I didn’t know whether or not to be happy or sad. I just knew that my cousins went to that school so at least I would be able to see them. I was satisfied with the thought of having my cousins nearby, but nothing could have prepared me, or my family for the events that would change my entire school year.

One day while sitting in class, the phone in Ms. Livingstone’s room rang. That was my first grade teacher. All I heard her say was, “Hello Livingstone’s room.” “Okay, let me pack her up and she’ll be right there.” “Adrienne” she said walking toward me, “Get your things together your mom is coming to get you!” I was excited because it’s not often that I was picked up early from school. As I sat on the outside of the front office waiting for my mom to show up I wondered what special place she was taking me today. For the next few hours, I sat on that wooden bench waiting for my mom who, I would learn later, was busy teaching her class in another county, and had no idea what was taking place.

At the end of the day, my cousin came up to the school to pick up her little sister and me and found that I was sitting on that same wooden bench outside of the office. When she inquired as to why I was sitting there, the office, who had forgotten that I was there, informed her that my mother had called that morning and was supposed to pick me up hours ago. When the office finally looked into the matter, they found that my mom had not made the call to pick me up. There had been some suspicious activity on the playground and that a lady whose identity could not be established had inquired about me earlier in the week. All of this would have been a case of mistaken communication, but my mom who worked nearly 90 minutes away had already suffered through two other frightening events. A couple years earlier, a strange woman tried to grab me by my hand and take me out of a clothing store. I lunged forward and yelled, “NO!” and the woman rang out the door. Not long after that, a man attempted to snatch me from my mother’s hand as we boarded the city bus. This incident at the school was the final straw. The school was not as concerned about the misunderstanding and didn’t find it necessary to increase security or alter the practice of sitting student outside of the office. Despite weeks of protest, recommendation, and accusations from the school that my mom as overreacting, I was
withdrawn from that school and eventually finished the year in a private school.