This morning I awoke to the sound of a police bullhorn blaring over the neighborhood. “Come downstairs, come out the front door, keep your hands up where I can see them!”, boomed the distant echoing voice, interspersed with short blasts of a police siren.
Shaking off deep sleep, I crawled out of bed and shoved my glasses on. Down the hall, I could hear my parents stirring.
“They’ve set up roadblocks,” said my mom, coming into my room. “I think they’re looking for someone!”
“Which house are they at?” I asked, peering around the edge of the curtains. I could see reflected blue light on the nearby church, and a police car and a road barrier near our house.
“They’re at the townhouse near the church,” called Dad. “I’m going to make sure the doors are locked. Keep away from the windows in case there’s shooting.”
Dad went downstairs and checked the locks. We didn’t turn on any lights. Mom and I stumbled downstairs to find our cell phones. (Of all nights, our landline phone wasn’t working. Dad had spent most of the previous evening trying to fix it without success.)
By this time, the bullhorn and the sirens had stopped, and since there was no sound of gunfire, we resumed peering out the windows.
Fire police, officers, and unmarked police cars milled about. An armored SWAT vehicle rolled past, gunmen perched all over it.
While we couldn’t see the front of the townhouse where the police had been ordering the suspect to come out, we could see the law enforcement gathered in the church parking lot. Ambulances waited nearby. Officers walked around with flashlights, shining their lights on the ground.
I prayed that things would end well.
“I don’t think our barn is locked,” said Mom. “I wish it would be. Someone could hide in there.”
I didn’t volunteer to go outside and lock the barn.
My parents recognized one of the fire police. “Look, it’s Dad’s co-worker.”
“One of the police opened the dumpster and looked inside. Wonder what they’re looking for?” Mom said. “Maybe drugs?”
“Or a weapon. Whoever they’re looking for, he did something big.”
“They’re taking away the roadblocks.” That was a good sign. “Maybe they got whoever they’re looking for.”
When it was obvious things had calmed down, Dad called his co-worker, who answered the phone by saying, “You can go outside now. They took him in.”
The emergency vehicles began leaving. I went back to bed about 4 a.m., glad we knew the danger was over.
Today, we learned more about what happened. The suspect had fired at FBI agents in Reading yesterday. He was hiding in a townhouse close to our house, and the FBI, along with our local police had surrounded the townhouse and arrested him.
Our phone line— and internet was fixed today. Otherwise, you probably wouldn’t be reading this right now. The problem wasn’t faulty wiring in our house, rather, there was a bird’s nest inside the connector box on the pole and the birds broke a wire.
In 1918, when the influenza epidemic swept the United States, my great-grandfather’s first wife died, leaving behind six young children. Great-Grandpa got remarried to the maid who came to help take care of the children. They had eight more children, and the youngest became my grandmother. So my family history was completely changed by an epidemic.
Today at work we talked about the coronavirus, which is turning into another epidemic, or maybe actually a pandemic.
My co-worker Kathryn said she was at Wal-Mart recently and the shelves where rice, canned vegetables, and medicine are kept were empty. (At the time of this writing, there are no reported cases of coronavirus in Pennsylvania.)
Last week, we sold a huge number of respirator face masks at work (some to speculators).
Some people dismiss coronavirus fears to be as silly as Y2K fears. There might be some similarities, but I don’t think anyone died from Y2K, and people have been dying of the coronavirus. But people also die from regular flu every year.
Like unexpected FBI raids in the night, we can never know exactly what tomorrow holds.
So, lock your doors, wash your hands, and leave to the rest to God.
Note about the featured image: It wasn’t full moon last night, but since I wasn’t thinking about taking pictures last night, this is the best “nighttime” image I could find!
Wow, imagine an FBI-wanted suspect in sleepy Leola.
On the coronavirus, last week a customer commented that he’s stocking up on masks, beans, dried food, and ammo. His rationale was that, even if the coronavirus didn’t bring an end to civilization as we know it, the stuff would be eventually useful. Hard to argue with that.
Your customer is not alone. I believe many people are stocking up because of the virus, and others are stocking up because of others stocking up. Meanwhile, there’s a hand sanitizer shortage too.