LockDown

It is about a week and a bit ago.
It is that time of year.
It's a bi-annual occasion. Sort of like my academic breakdowns.
Smallwood comes to visit from whatever portion of Canada she is festering in.
And we have awkward coffee.
The awkwardest.
She's to pick me up so that we can go to one of the pretentious depositories downtown.
She arrives in a flash jacket and we get started.
Or we would.
But I can't lock the door. Because it's frozen.
The key enters it's little sheath about halfway, and then 'brings up,' as it were.
I'm immediately conscious of the fact that I have no idea how to fix this.
I act casual.
Fleetingly so.
I begin to heat the key with the flame of a weed lighter.
Not that I believe it will work, mind you.
But simply because the quicker I spring into some semblance of action, the more handy I seem.
The hot key succeeds in embarassing me. And little else.
The apartment is unclean, by the way.
Because I thought that we wouldn't be entering it.
So we leave.
I call Colin and tell him what's what.
"Go home!"
We turn around.
Colin administers other advice that I put into practice once we get back.
I make Smallwood tea. But not before offering her coffee, as I always do.
Because I'm forgetful.
I put the wee straw attachment on the WD40 can, and get to it.
The key immediately enters its little sheath again, and briefly, just briefly, I consider myself manly enough to deserve my chest hair.
The key still will not turn, of course.
So I move to contingency B. The hair dryer.
"Want to meet my neighbors?" I ask.
She says something I can't remember, and we're off!
Luckily Crystal's hair is more complicated than mine and Colin's.
When the key will finally turn in the lock properly, there isn't enough time to head downtown and sit sensibly before she is to leave for whatever social event that is to follow.
An event that will no doubt be more organized.
And will likely transpire in a dwelling with fewer fruit flies.
We therefore stay in, and Smallwood terrifies me with recounts of her experiences in law school.
I asked her long before this encounter if there were many lamps there.
I have always pictured law school to have a lot of lamps.
The desk lamps, with the green shades?
There aren't that many lamps.
But there are a lot of deliberations.
They grade on a curve.
Conversation exhausts, and she eventually (awkwardly) bids farewell.
I told her over coffee and tea that I would put this into the blog.
"I think I'm going to call it 'lock down'," I tell her.
And now I have.