When I leave my house I lock both locks on the front door. One lock is the classic little thumb/pointer finger twister on the knob inside of the house. So I twist that into locked position and pull the door behind me. If I hadn’t remembered to not put them in my pocket as I grabbed them on my way out the door, then I take my keys out of my pocket and lock the second lock – a deadbolt – from the outside with the key. I put the keys in the pocket that I’m always trying to remember to always put them in and I’m on my way.
It’s an old door that can barely keep a draft out of an even older house. I’ll save myself the extra unnecessary step of fondling of keys from outside of the pockets to unlock the twist knob if I only lock the deadbolt and forget about the whole doorknob lock process. And at that point, only having one lock moves the whole concept one step closer to forfeiting its false sense of security altogether.
So when I come back home I find I have forgotten to remember something I was trying to forget and found I had left myself two locks to fumble for in the dark. Something that I am doing is something I had either decided on doing that day or something that has come by surprise that now I must do because I forgot to remember. I can also do something and remember I had to do something else and keep doing what I was doing but I have to remember to do that in which I am supposed to remember to do also. That role can become reversed and the something that has interrupted the original thing I was doing becomes priority and I completely forget to complete that which I originally set out to do. I’ll eventually remember what I was doing at first.
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A friend of mine who is a firefighter says they all keep doorstoppers strapped to their helmets, some he said, with deflated bicycle inner tubes. They call these wedges of wood “chocks” and use them to “chock-up” a door on their way into a building by stuffing it up in between the top of the door and the corner of the frame.
My doorstopper lies in the corner and gathers dust. When someone reaches into this corner groping for and retrieving the doorstopper, dust lightly soils the hand of the casual doorstopper user who then might occasionally grab a broom to sweep dust out of that same corner. Stewed up by the friction of broom-use, door stopper dust and human oils creates a sludgy mixture that collects on the end of the broom handle. This broom gets put back where it was propped-up in the corner of the closet on the other side of the house leaving its mark on the walls in the corner.
Like keys living in pockets, things like doorstoppers and brooms are most likely where they usually are. They can also find themselves left in bizarre, sometimes out of reach locations. Because these things are used by people where they become misplaced is usually within reasonable reach. So, just like I understand how hard a glass can be slammed on a table before it breaks I think I understand how my body can stretch to reach something and so I think I know if I can successfully step on tippy toes to obtain what I want. I find myself stretching, twisting, and extending all limbs to attain the prized object of desire. The location of the misplaced object might force upon me the act of conjuring higher powers by standing on something. I experience this strange, unplanned struggle all to achieve what should have been as simple as reaching for something you know is in your pocket – or strapped to your helmet. Like corners of closets seats of pants become soiled when a certain sturdy chair also holds the occupation as the step stool.
