That Time I Busted Through the Door With an Ax

I have a history of breaking and entering, but that’s another story. For the record, this is the first time (and only, I anticipate) I have used any part of an ax to do so. Let me break it down for you.

Haha. Break it down.

It was a hot Friday in June. This June. So like, one month and a couple of days ago. I was doing what any good gardener does early that morning — watering my precious plants. That day my husband had to be at a professional development seminar about 15 minutes away, so he was up early that morning as well. I had lots planned for the day. The next morning we were leaving to fly back east for our extremely delayed trip to visit his parents and a few other family members. There was laundry to be done, dishes to wash, animals to care for, and of course, because I don’t do things until the last minute — bags to be packed.

Kevin leaned out the back door to tell me he was leaving. I smiled and waved, continuing on with my task. Watering took me about another 10 minutes and then I decided to plant a shrub that had needed to be in the ground weeks before. It was on the front porch so I headed to the back door to take a short cut through the house. The handle turned, but the door didn’t open.

Hmm. Must be stuck.

I pushed harder. Nothing. The deadbolt was locked.

Now, I wasn’t immediately angry. Just aggravated. Like I said, history of breaking and entering and all that, I’m pretty good at getting out of jams. I’m resourceful. So I assessed the situation.

1. There was no going through the backdoor. It’s brand new with good locks and there’s just no messing it up to get in the house.
2. My phone was in the house
3. Every other door into my house was locked.
4. All the windows were locked.
5. All of my harmless neighbors had already left for work.
6. I wasn’t sufficiently dressed to go knocking on doors. It was 8 a.m. Can I get an “amen” from a lady who knows what I’m talking about?

It was much worse than I had originally thought.

But then I remembered. We have a really old door on the back of the garage that needed to be replaced anyway, so I thought I could just knock off the door knob like they do in movies and make my way in.

First I wanted to see if I could slam into the thing with my shoulder and get in that way.

I hurt my shoulder. The door didn’t move.

I grabbed a brick and went at the door knob. Bang. Bang. BANG. Nothing. I should tell you that the door knob was already pretty badly torn up from when my old dog, Lulu, had her nervous breakdown and would chew on it. And the underneath side of the door. Thanks, Lu. I wouldn’t have made it inside the house if it weren’t for you. I went at it with the brick for another 10 minutes or so with no results.

Then I grabbed the hoe. Stuck it behind the door knob and thought I could just pop that thing right off there.

Then I broke the hoe.

As a last resort, I tried to stick my hand up under the door to see how much further up the door knob was so that maybe I could unlock it. It was a long way. I tried unlocking it from the other side with a stick. Didn’t work. I tried pulling a MacGuyver and using some tough grass as a key. I think you can imagine how that went.

While my hand was under there I felt the ax handle and I pulled it out.

FYI, there’s no ax head on the end of the handle. Just so we’re clear.

I tried loosening the door knob with the ax handle. That didn’t work. Then I tried breaking away the bottom of the door with it. I did see some progress there, but I was quickly losing hope. I had been locked out for about 40 minutes at this point and was nearing tears. There’s just something about being locked out of your house, you know?

And then the dog walked over and laid down beside me and I knew — I was going to die out here.

With one final burst of adrenaline, the kind that makes me believe that YES, I can give birth to a baby someday like my ancestor did out in the woods without any IV drips, I grabbed the handle and plowed through that door. Chopped about a quarter of it down. I reached up under that door and unlocked it.

Sweet relief. I was in the house. And as soon as I was inside, the phone rang. I ran to answer it, out of breath for so many reasons. It was my mom.

“I have been trying to call you. Why weren’t you answering the phone.”

WAIL.

“What’s wrong with you?”

“I…was…locked…out of the house [sobbing commences].”

“Well how did that happen?”

“Kevin locked me out!”

(I should probably mention that my time outside had been spent alternately praying and plotting how I would kill my husband.)

“Well, he didn’t mean to.”

And then she laughed. And I was in no mood for it. She could tell and we weren’t on the phone much longer.

As I was in the middle of typing a not-so-nice text message to my husband, the phone rang again and I answered it all pitiful, expecting it to be my mom again.

Instead, it was an administrator calling to set up an interview with Kevin. An interview for a job that he needed. That we needed. There was no time for being upset. And that was nice of God to intervene in that way because, seriously? I was about to Throw. Down. For the next 45 minutes I had to work on contacting Kevin at this meeting he was at, which proved to be very difficult when he had his phone on silent, but I finally managed to get a hold of him. He had the interview right then and we found out a few weeks later that he got the job.

And that’s how I busted through the door with an ax (handle).

Related posts:

1. How Does My Garden Grow
2. Seasonal Hair Loss
3. A cold, quiet morning