Weekly Zephyr #48: Unplanned detour

April 25, 2018

Fiona Rae, Night Vision

This isn't the edition of the Zephyr I'd planned to send this week. I was in the middle of composing something exuberant but we got an email from my oldest son's middle school a little while ago:

Yesterday afternoon, one of our students found some disturbing language in one of our bathrooms. She reported this information to administration, and we took immediate action. We documented the graffiti and notified the district’s Safety and Security Office and the Seattle Police Department (SPD). Their investigation is ongoing.

The graffiti, which stated that, “I am gonna shoot up the school, April 26th, 2018,” is disturbing, and we wanted families to be aware. The district takes all potential threats seriously, however, most threats are not found to be credible. In this case, the District and SPD are continuing their investigation, although at this time it appears the graffiti is more consistent with a prank than a credible threat.

Because of the recent events in our nation, and in an abundance of caution, we will be having additional SPD and district Security on campus on Thursday. Each family knows their student the best, therefore we want to make sure that you have an opportunity to talk with your student to determine if attending school tomorrow is appropriate. Any absences would be considered excused and classwork could be made up.

No school then. School will pick up as vulnerable as ever to life in this country on Friday. How we meet Friday is TBD.  In the meantime: a hot, sick feeling for all us parents. It's never anybody's turn but we're on deck tonight to hold a bit more than usual of the psychic weight we all share.

NOTE: THAT WE TAKE A CERTAIN AMOUNT OF SAFETY FOR GRANTED IS A PRIVILEGE GRANTED TO WHITE PEOPLE WITH WHITE KIDS, AND I KNOW THIS UH-OH—WHAAAAT—USSS?? FEELING IS EVIDENCE OF THAT. PERHAPS WE CAN CASH THIS FEAR & SICK FEELING IN FOR SOME HEIGHTENED EMPATHY.

  Dave and I consulted about how we'd present the news to Finn. On the one hand, what's happening in our country is real and he obviously knows about it/walked out with the March for Our Lives a few weeks ago/is a school kid in America.  So what do we factor in?  He's twelve, so, okay. Twelve. What's a good amount of fear for twelve? Is it different than the target amount for eleven? Do we wait and crank it more at thirteen? We're going to deliver a form of the truth, yes, but do we bubble wrap it a little? The answer is yes. We, Tina & Dave Rowley, for this guy in this moment, bubble wrap it a little.  We pulled him aside and told him that they found graffiti at the school from somebody who said they were planning on hurting people tomorrow. We told him that the police are going to be at school tomorrow and that they think it's probably a prank but it might not be, and then we told him he's staying home.  Finn was wary and still for the first part of the dispatch and then he burst into a grin and twirled around at the kicker.   "Yeah!" we said. "Fun, huh? No school! Okay, so, that's the deal."  He danced off to enjoy his new leisure.  Dave and I looked at each other and muttered things like fuck it, he's twelve, that's enough weight for him to hold right now and then we adjusted ourselves and went out into the living room to make like it's a normal night where we feel cool and normal. I did hide upstairs in our bedroom to feel it for 40 minutes or so and then I came downstairs, popped half a Xanax, and we all snuggled up and watched Survivor.