Musings, Random, of Course

Have you ever thought about how the front doors of our houses open in? If I’d ever considered it, I probably figured it was a kind of welcoming thing - I step back and open my home to the person on the outside. But it’s odd, too, because from a security standpoint, once you’ve opened that door, you’re at a disadvantage.

Not rampant paranoia, just thinking about how many things in our lives came down from the way people lived in the past, and defending your portals would have been a major consideration. What got me thinking about this is my mother’s home. She’s like many elderly people, frightened, paranoid, and unwilling to throw anything away. She worries about people breaking into her home, so she barricaded the front door with boxes of junk, which I am now trying to sort through so we can actually use the door again. Would she feel more secure if the door opened outward? Although, I suppose it would be easier to push the door closed from the inside if you felt threatened than to try to pull it closed if someone on the other side were trying to yank it open.

This reminds me of a bad experience I had when I lived in Baltimore. I and two women I worked with lived within a block and a half of each other. We were all used to getting up early for work, so it wasn’t unheard of for any of us to be out and going to the grocery store Sunday morning at 5:30 or 6. I was up, in my robe and slippers when the doorbell rang. My first thought was that it was one of my friends wanting me to go shopping with them or, maybe, they’d already been out and realized they’d locked themselves out. No biggie.

I lived in huge row house that had been converted into three flats, one on each floor. I had the groundfloor, so I opened my door on the inside entry of the building. There was a man standing in the outside entry of the building, i.e., inside the front door, but not in the building. When he saw me, he held up the rolled newspaper, saying it was for the people on the third floor. We went back and forth with me telling him to ring their bell then, him saying they weren’t answering, me telling him I wasn’t letting him in the building, then…he held out the paper and said, in a disgusted tone, “Well, just take it then, and give it to them when they come down.”

Now, I know just the same as anyone else does that it would be really dumb to open the door to a stranger, but there’s some reflex that causes us, when something is held out to us, to reach out and take it. Of course, I had to open the door in order to take it. Yeah. He pushed his way in and pulled a big, ugly gun out of his jacket. I know I have never in my life, before or since, been that frightened.

When I gasped, and I sounded like someone who had nearly drown dragging in a huge lungful of air, he chuckled. The bastard laughed to know I was so afraid of him and he was in the power seat. Are y’all on the edge of your chairs??? This next bit was surreal.

I was gaping at him, too frightened to think anything but I’m going to die, when I saw something in my periferal vision. I dragged my eyes away to see what it was. He turned to look, too. No, it wasn’t a ploy on my part. No, it wasn’t someone coming to my rescue. It was my hands. That reptilian brain that takes over when we are grievously threatened had me moving my arms toward him, and it was just the break I needed. Before he could react, I had pushed him back out the door.

He threw himself against it from the outside, but I threw myself against it from the inside. He was down a step from me, so I had extra leverage. I got it closed and locked, all with us still staring at each other. The doors had glass in the upper 60% of them, but he never thought to shoot through it or even threaten to.

I literally talked myself into my flat, closed and locked that door, and called 911. If the front door had opened outward, I’d never have been able to shut it on him. Makes you think. Makes you glad whoever decided doors should open inward had that brainstorm.

Anyone else have a harrowing tale to share? Anyone else have some thoughts on how things we take for granted got to be the way they are? Anyone else want to come help me dig my mother’s house out. ;+))) Nah, I wouldn’t ask that of my worst enemy. Well, maybe my worst enemy. Just think of the possibilities for torture.

36 comments January 6th, 2007