Walking Into Things

Your humble Contributor, ever mindful of the safety and edification of our gentle visitors, has these brief thoughts to pass along.

Now, we are all familiar enough with doors. These days, more and more will simply open for one who approaches, provided that the generally attentive imp perched in his smokey, little glass case is alert and one's gait speed is within his range of tolerance. Then, the imp pulls whatever lever he must, and the machinery of the fine ingress or egress is engaged, and -- hooray! -- the portal to another internal world -- such as , say, Walmart -- is op'd. And, the vigilant imp turns his attention to the next entrant, cracking another tiny sunflower seed between his teeth.

But, most closed doors still require the turn of a knob to open. Your humble Contributor learned this anew today -- the marvelous engineering of a door -- a small, but complete twist of hand is all that is required. But, that much is definitely required. Oh, and, these doors are so solid and sound and still, especially the metal variety: wonderfully resistant to flesh and bone in motion. What an impression they leave.

So too, signposts, your Contributor has discovered. These spectacles, which fairly give him sight, still bar the faint mark left by such a post -- let's see, the head was turned to the side, distracted by some non-prescribed spectacle, as the head, including vision-correction gear, and most of the torso (along a vertical line) addressed the slightly rusted steel edge mid-stride. Something of a shock, yes: like bumping into a particularly hard, immovable stranger.

Hello! Oh, dear! Are you alright? I'd offer you a hand; but, well, as you see.... Yes, I maintain this same outpost -- I am a post, after all -- standing vigil over this special space reserved for the weak of limb; warning away the sleek and the strong, lest they suffer rebuke and penalty; never mind the weather or the hour. I am here -- and, of course, now, you have found me. Delighted.

Such chance meetings. And, as a consequence, the tiny screw on the glass frame ever seeks to loosen itself and free the old, slightly marred but still lucid lens, and the crease in the forehead shows forth most noticeably during expressions of surprise -- such in that millisecond before the face strikes the door.

Though, age does present it's problems. Clerks at three separate stores politely noted that no clip-on sunvisors are now available for these "dated" glasses; one graciously offered that she had not seen such since the last century. What a charming salesgirl.

But, there it is: a lesson in physics, engineering, fashion, and the serendipitous encounters with man-made objects. To some, we might suppose, these are pedestrian observations -- but, then, your Contributor was on foot.

Comments

[Harry]

At least you met a polite one, and not the sort than laugh unsympathetically at the one-step wince-and-hop. Ouch to both sorts, though. Who do they think they are?

[The Bubaker]

Remainder man, we've told you before, people are not meant to know about these things. YOU MUST NOT TELL PEOPLE ABOUT THE IMPS! Sheesh. The illusion of technology must be retained.

[Gone Away]

Well, well. Cross pollination is alive and well but not living in Argentina... ;)

[Remainderman]

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN:

There are no imps in the smokey, little glass cases. We made that up.

[Gone Away]

This morning, being still totally exhausted from the exertions of Thermopylae, I decided that a day off would be in order. After all, it is Thursday and who, in their right mind, works on a Thursday? I had entertained a brief notion to write a piece on Groundhog Day, it being the day after said day, which would have been in keeping with our editorial policy of never being first with the news; but then it occurred to me that it was still a little early to do such a thing. People might accuse me of trying to compete with those newsy sites that delight in throwing the latest URL in your face with a "Hah, I saw it first" look in their eye.

So I opted for the day off. Thinking to take a brief stroll to celebrate my decision, I left our little village and wandered off in the direction of the big city, Blogger, dropping in on the way to greet a few of the inhabitants. Arriving at the Hereunder Mansion, I sauntered inside, being a regular visitor these days (they have yet to find me out and debar me from the premises), and signed the visitor's book with a brief comment upon the latest offering. I then thought what a good day it was to do a spot of archaeology.

Now, the Hereunder Mansion is a good place to start such an activity. It has extensive archives in the dungeon within which one can spend many happy hours. Going to the back of the house down the long corridor which faces the front door, I arrived at the Archives Section. There are three doors, labeled December, January and February. Well, it was archaeology I was bent upon so I immediately selected the oldest entrance on offer and used it.

Once inside these dungeons of the departed, there is a veritable feast of delights to be found. I wandered through the rooms, having a look and sometimes inserting brief notes to confuse later historians. It was then that I discovered a curious feature pertaining to the architecture of the mansion. Understand that I am making no specific complaint about this feature, having already come across it in many of the Blogger houses. In the words of the fellow with the duck in the television advertisement, however, "It's very annoying."

The problem is in the construction of the archives. Essentially they consist of a long passage off which there are many rooms, all provided with a door for easy access. It works well enough if one just saunters along, opening a door here, a door there, glancing in for a brief view of the contents. But, should one decide that here is an excellent opportunity to leave something incriminating and enter the room for this purpose (thereby having to let go of the door), one finds that the door is provided with a spring attachment that swings it closed automatically.

Once having deposited one's little gift to the inhabitants of the mansion, one turns to the door to continue one's exploration, only to find it inexplicably locked. Fortunately, all these rooms have a narrow window (usually with graffiti proclaiming "home" scrawled across the pane by some hapless wag) and one is able to squeeze through this aperture with the intention of going upon one's way.

It is at this point that one realizes the obvious. All windows, by their very nature, must lead to the outside. One finds oneself, not back in the archives, but outside the house. It is therefore necessary, should one wish to continue one's exploration, to re-enter by the front door, walk all the way to the back of the place and return to one's point of departure through the long passage that is the archives.

After one has does done this a few times, it becomes a little exasperating (aside from putting a heavy sweat upon one's face from the unaccustomed exercise). Halfway through December, I gave up and walked back to my own place of abode, cheered, it's true, by the thought that I had avenged a similar planting of an unexploded bomb within my own archives by the Remainderman not two days hence.

Let him, in his search for my illicit deposits, appreciate now the superior design of my own humble cottage basement, I thought.

[Hannah]

There is such a thing as a back button on your browser, my dear chameleon.

[Gone Away]

Which takes you back to the comment section, my dear Hannah. :D

[Remainderman]

Why not just go "Home".

[Gone Away]

I often do...

[Remainderman]

Alright, well, we suppose the prior comment was on topic -- at least, by analogy -- portals, doors, whatnot.

As to the labyrinthine ways of the blog, we have little control over it. We have discussed other ways & means, but no decision yet. You can be sure, however, that our gentle visitors will be served... with papers, if necessary.

[Gone Away]

I have that writ large upon my portal, yessiree.

[Harry]

Look. If I'm not here (which is often the case, having many slaves to tote, heave, fan, fawn, feed, massage unreachables, oust unteachables, fetch unspeakables, garnish, varnish, splay, stray or stack hay for mine fine self), then I must be lost upstairs in November.


At least I thought that's what she said her name was.