training day

We sat in the pews and looked forward. There were nerves fluttering in the air, though there was no need for fear. Right?

Three men strode into the sanctuary and called out, “We’re looking for Jennifer!”

I was told, at a Holocaust teaching training, not to ask students, what would you do? What would you do if Anne Frank begged you to hide in your attic?

I get that this downplays the actual, physical fear that accompanies self-sacrifice, as well as the fire that can propel people to stand up for what is right, illogical though their actions may seem.

When the three men came in looking for pretend Jennifer, we were to practice how to observe an ICE operation. We had been listening to trainers go over what to do, and why. This was practice.

Should I really get up, though?

I got up. Filming (in landscape!), I followed one of the faux ICE agents, and he told me I was not allowed to film him. “Yes, I am,” I said. “Do you have some ID?”

What I could relate to in this practice was the time I got pulled over at a DUI checkpoint, many years ago. “Have you been drinking?” the cop asked. Like an idiot, i said, I had a drink earlier tonight.

Don’t say that.

He got me out of the car, had me walk the line, and say the alphabet backwards. I was so scared my knees were literally knocking together.

I felt totally sober. It was true I had waited hours to drive home. But I also felt a little shaky because I had taken cold medicine, and I wondered if that would affect the results. And as a boring white lady, I had no experience confronting law enforcement.

“You failed the test,” the cop said.

“What part did I fail?” I asked.

“You’re pretty argumentative,” he said.

“I just want to know what part I failed,” I said, mentally running through what I had learned about my constitutional rights in 12th grade (which was a long, long time ago).

“You don’t know what part you failed?”

His bullying lit a little fire in me that said, “You don’t have probably cause, here, buddy.” It pissed me off that he could trample on my rights. I had the courage of a person whose father is a lawyer.

“Since you failed, I’ll need you to do a breathalyzer,” the officer said.

I looked at him. I breathed. “No, I don’t think so,” I said.

“If you won’t do that, we’ll have to take you to the hospital and have your blood drawn.”

I paused. “Okay.”

I was calling his bluff.

“Okay, then. I’ll be right back.” He walked away into the darkness.

Now, I was completely wrong here. The police do not have to have probable cause to ask you to take a breathalyzer.

I did not know this.

But I knew I was being bullied.

After a couple of terrifying moments, the guy returned, handed me my keys, and said, “You’re free to go.”

Let me repeat: I was entirely wrong. To prevent drunk driving, Americans have decided to let go of a person’s right to not be searched in favor of the public’s right to know if you are a danger.

I learned a lot from this experience (including that), including the fact that if I was faced with injustice, I could be stubborn as hell. I could say no to someone in power. (And acknowledge the reason I could get stubborn had a lot to do with my privilege as a white lady, someone who’s not an addict, who grew up knowing she always had a lawyer.)

So I got up during our ICE practice, and I felt fine about demanding ID from the pretend ICE officer.

“Take care of yourself tonight,” the organizers said. “This is stressful.”

It was stressful, but it also felt good to be in a room full of people who cared enough about their neighbors to be trained to do something two people were recently shot in the head for doing.

I went home, watched some bad TV, and slept.

The next day, I had my last class of the day, with two students who are… resistant. By the end of the day, they’re done behaving, and often enjoy calling each other profane names and throwing things at each other.

I was as usual asking one of them to sit down, and asking them to sit down again, and I felt a surge of adrenaline. SIT DOWN I’M GOING TO SIT DOWN SIT DOWN SIT THE FUCK DOWN

I went to get backup. Which was fine. I didn’t lose it. I surprised myself, though. It had been a quiet, easy day of teaching. A kid had helped me clean out the fish tank. A kid had been singing “Kung Fu Fighting,” so I put the song on, and we danced to it. It was a day the kids were mostly occupied in individual work, and I was mostly occupied planning future lessons.

An avalanche of fear, of the unfairness of life, had fallen on me while my last two students were bickering. I was out of control! I could not fix this! I had felt it build up at the church, but as with so many of my emotions, as I age, the full weight of what I felt wasn’t immediate. It was tape-delayed.

“Don’t make it about you,” our trainers advised. “Don’t be a hero.”

“You aren’t there to prevent ICE from doing their job, you are there to document what happens.”

I wish my visceral emotional experiences weren’t so divorced from their causes. It would be less confusing. I’ve always been this way to some extent, but I feel like the gap grows wider, as in adult life, especially my adult life, working with traumatized teenagers, I have to stay steady in the moment, and process later.

“How did you feel?” the organizers asked one of the men who had played an ICE agent.

“When more people were up and asking me questions, I felt more scared. I didn’t know what to say. I felt more aggressive.”

Although the men were just pretending to be bullies, when I walked out, past one of them, I didn’t want to look him in the eye.

They didn’t find Jennifer.

Note: I limited what I shared here, based on the request of the trainers I worked with. Let me reiterate, though: this was not training in interfering with ICE, but with demanding accountability and creating documentation. Whether that’s enough for you, or too much for you, that’s the level I’m discussing here.