saving the day

Like many doors here in Manhattan, Amy and I’s new apartment door locks when you pull it shut behind you. This is a nice feature, but one that I am not use to as my old apartment needed to be locked upon exit. The other day while doing laundry (amy in her PJs and me barefoot in my knicks shorts and a white t-shirt) I pulled the door shut behind me without thinking about it locking. Sure enough, neither of us had keys and the doorman had just given us our spare and it was sitting on our entry way table. After a brief panic (especially after amy remembered she had food in the oven) I went downstairs to see what advice the on duty doorman had for us. He said that a locksmith at that time of night is around $300 bucks in this neighborhood and would probably take a while to arrive. But he mentioned that if I had credit card I could try to pick the lock. Well I didn’t have a credit card - I didn’t even have pockets in my shorts. So he lent me an old room key card he had from a hotel somewhere in Puerto Rico. I was like you think this will work? He said probably not, but its worth a shot.

I came up to deliver the news of the cost of a handyman and told amy to prepare for burnt food as I started to wiggle the room key around our door. The problem with picking our door is the gap where the lock is, actually isn’t visible and is hidden from site by an overlapping metal piece of the door frame. So, to pick the lock, one would have to maneuver around the door frame into the door gap and then down into the lock. I didn’t do a great job explaining it, but it was a daunting task. After a few unsuccessful tries I made a little progress and felt the lock jiggle. Just as I was starting to get discouraged again - BAM… she popped right open. Our dinner, laundry, and wallets were saved! Whew.