As I was doing laundry this evening, my now-functioning lock on my front door finally did me in. I had set the deadbolt to keep the door from closing but must have absent mindedly unset it during one of my trips to the laundry room. With my arms full of dirty massage sheets, I saw the door slam and thought.. shit.
I have a bunch of spare keys made for the fixed lock, but they have not been distributed to my friends for safe keeping yet. No spare keys floating around anywhere. No phone. No shoes. Sunday. Holiday weekend.
So I sat around wondering what to do. I even tried the old ‘business card to jimmy the door’ trick which tends to fail miserably on locks that require a key for the door to open at all. I’d already started laundry and didn’t even have the quarters to dry them once the loads were done. It took about 10 minutes to realize.. hm. I am washing SHEETs.
And I live on the top floor.
And you can access my roof..
And my window is open. And my screen is easy to remove.
You get the idea.
I spent well over an hour after the spin cycle on the roof, tying damp sheets in different configurations to the ridiculously perfect beefy railing. Climbing is all about knots and I perform on bulk fabric all the time – easy right? Nah. One sheet wasn’t long enough, but I absolutely didn’t trust two tied together, and was having difficulty thinking up a way to devise a safety, which I wouldn’t go without. The reality of using sheets to do this was quite different than the movies. There was just no way.
I was determined to utilize this opportunity to save myself a buttload of money calling out a locksmith to open my apartment. The damn open window was only 10 feet away! However, I was starting to get a bit frustrated with the ridiculousness of the sheet idea when it hit me – We have aerial equipment at the studio. And a climbing harness, which we use to swap out equipment when we’re using the rig.
So off I went, tromping barefoot on the street, with a mission. Get the stuff and get back to the roof before dark, which wasn’t far off.
A short time later, I had two spansets attached to the climbing harness as a safety, and my aerial rope to repel from. I checked and checked and checked again to make sure all the equipment was set correctly and safely, that I wouldn’t get tangled up in anything. Then there I was, huddled on the wrong side of the railing as dusk was setting.
I have to say, it really took some nuts to lower myself off the side of that building. Even if I had just let go, I would have had a bit of a jolt when the harness caught me. Probably just scraped myself up on the side of the building some and added to the indignity of locking myself out in the first place. It took nerve, all the same, even all set up like I was and clipped in the whole time. Very counter intuitive.
The spansets were the perfect length. I hung freely and safely after a slow decent right where I needed to be. I took my screen off the largest of my three windows and had enough slack in the line to stand on my windowsill comfortably and unclip. After all those mental gymnastics, once I’d figured out how to do it sanely and had confidence in my equipment, it took me about 30 seconds to get into my apartment.
And I did this all in a skirt.
What an adventure! I tell ya, I wouldn’t mind breaking into my apartment like that again. I sure don’t have much desire to walk to and from the studio barefoot again if I do. That was the worst of it all really.