How Much is That Mommy in the Window?

Mom was a young mother. She turned 30 two months after Craig & Kyle were born. Growing up, she still knew how to play. And that was great for us.

One such playful afternoon, she and Scott had somehow started a game of "Got You Last" tag inside the house (Pecan Lane in Edenwood at that time). They kept running back and forth to get away from each other, and before long it was all of us kids against Mom.

Well, she tagged whoever it was last and darted down the hallway to her bedroom, then into the master bath where she promptly slammed and locked the door. Five laughing, screaming kiddos came speeding down the hall after her. Upon realizing the door was locked and she wasn't about to open it, Scott ran back to the kitchen for a butter knife to pry open the lock. All five of us were yelling and banging on the door while he honed his catburglar skills.

Meanwhile, Mom was inside strategizing a brilliant surprise attack. While we were all occupied outside the door, she had the bright idea to quietly crawl out of the window, jump down to the front porch, sneak back inside through the garage and get us from behind. And that's just what she proceeded to do.

Perched precariously on the toilet and then the vanity, she managed to straddle the rather high windowsill and was ready to easily lower herself onto the front porch and foil her young entourage. Just one problem. When she glanced down to gauge the distance, there was no front porch to lower herself onto. Turns out the window fell just a hair short of actually hanging above the porch. It was too far to drop all the way to the ground, and too far to reach the vanity again with her right leg. She was stuck.

Through the locked door, she told us to go outside to the front of the house. We laughed. Scott almost had the lock open -- but dang it, the knife slipped. "No, really," she said, "come outside. I'm out here." Yet she was telling us this from inside the bathroom. What did she think we were, stupid? We called her bluff and said she'd be sorry when we got that door open.

"Get on the front porch right now!" She was serious. So we mumbled and groaned and walked out the front door to find our mother hanging halfway out a tiny window that was way too high for any of us to reach. The barrage of questions began: How did she get up there? What was she doing? How was she going to get down? Was she going to stay up there until Dad got home?

The answer to that last one was a resounding NO, as young Kevin had already run next door to tell Mr. J, who was not only our neighbor but also our elementary school principal, that his Mom was stuck in the bathroom window and needed help right away.

And that's how the Caldwell Kids and their fearless Mother became forever immortalized in Mr. J's retelling of his heroic first response...at each of our high school graduations.