Nose for News by Sarah Stultz

It’s been a whirlwind the last two weeks since I accepted the job of managing editor at the Tribune.

In the middle of working on our Progress special section, finishing up our March and April issue of Albert Lea magazine and putting out newspapers each day (all while still being down a reporter) I breathe a sigh of relief when I go home for the day to begin my second job outside of the Tribune. In my role as a mother to my 6-year-old daughter, Sophie, and my 3-year-old son, Landon, this week has had its challenges as well.

For those of you who haven’t had the chance to meet Landon, he is an energetic little boy with a great curiosity. He is always on the run and is learning how to communicate. Sometimes he follows directions and sometimes he doesn’t. Also noteworthy, he is gaining an interest in being potty-trained.

On the last Friday at the end of January, after returning home from the Minnesota Newspaper Association annual convention, my husband was getting ready to walk out the door for his third-shift job at Viracon in Owatonna when Landon took off his pants and diaper and dashed up the stairs.

Calling up after him, I asked him to come back downstairs, but the next thing I knew I could hear him calling out, “mama, mama” from behind the upstairs bathroom door. He had done just what I had feared: locked himself in the bathroom.

It was the first time he had ever tried turning the sliding lock on the door, and of course he doesn’t know how to unlock it.

With my husband crunched to get to work on time, I called on my neighbor Wayne to see if he could get into the bathroom through a window. Unfortunately, we found it was locked. Inside the house, Wayne checked the lock on the door and the hinges of the door, but they were all on the inside of the door where Landon was.

He told me he was sorry but he couldn’t help, and I knew at that time I was going to have to call for further aid.

Embarrassed but ready to get Landon out, I called the nonemergency line at the Albert Lea Police Department and explained my situation.

Used to interacting with the officers on a daily basis for work, it was unusual calling one of them to my own house. I waited just a few minutes before Officer Jacob Stockwell arrived at the house, and after a few more minutes he heaved the door open. Landon came running out, sobbing and clearly confused. I took him downstairs and held him close for probably five or 10 minutes until he calmed down.

Though we will likely have to get a new door — it now has a big crack going through half of it — Landon was out, safe and sound, and that’s all that mattered.

Now, every time Landon places a foot on the stairs without me right behind him, I think back to that afternoon.

Though we will eventually get a new door, in the meantime you better believe we have taped off that lock. I’m not going to go through that again.

I guess he keeps me on my toes.

 

Sarah Stultz is the managing editor of the Albert Lea Tribune. She can be reached at 379-3433 or sarah.stultz@albertleatribune.com