I AIN'T ALWAYS

Blog number 119                                               Oct. 1, 2007

Coming down Cottonwood Avenue this afternoon at rush hour, I spied a man pushing another man in a wheelchair.  They were caught in a passing lane by onrushing traffic, two lanes on each side, one hundred feet from a traffic lighted crosswalk.  What's up with that?

Last March when my loving wife was in the hospital for knee surgery, I accidentally locked myself out of the house.  I went around looking for unlocked windows and doors, finding none.  I didn't have access to any of my tools, so I couldn't break into a door.  The only thing I could think of to do was to break a window and then clean the whole mess up before Teresa saw it.  I could think of no other way to solve the problem.

I took a brick from the pile in the backyard and hit the family room window.  It didn't break.  I wrapped the brick in a rag I had on the verandah and gave the window a smart smack.  Nothing.  OK, I gotta get this done.  I stepped back about ten feet, took the towel off the brick and threw it as hard as I could at the window.  It bounced off the window and landed about six feet away.  Whaaaaa?

I left the brick where it landed to show to my youngest son when he came over, because I was very impressed with the glass being used nowadays.  Funny that no mention was made of this glass when we bought the house.  Seems like something like that has bragging rights.

But I still had to get in.  I was done trying to break a window.  My next great idea was to go next door and borrow a wood chisel and cut a hole in the front door and get in that way.

While the lady next door looked for a chisel, she happened to ask me why I didn't call a locksmith.  I guess she thought I had some neurotic aversion to them, but to tell you the truth, it never crossed my mind.  Did I feel silly!

If I remember right, the locksmith cost me forty-six dollars and he was all done a half hour after I called him.  Simple.  Cheap.

I told my youngest son about my adventure, showed him where the brick had landed after bouncing off the window, I showed him the mark on the window where the brick had hit, and I swore him to secrecy because I didn't want the lovely Teresa to know anything about it.

About a week later her and I were out front and the next door lady drove by and yelled out asking about the locksmith.  Teresa asked me what that was all about, so I told her about locking myself out of the house, but I didn't tell her about throwing the brick at our window.  Not then I didn't.

Even later that month I was talking to a guy at Starbucks and we got to talking about buying new houses and I got excited and told him about the magnificently strong windows being made now, AND about bouncing a brick off our window.  Teresa was right there listening.  Stupid!