The strangest thing happened to me today.
My best cousin Elizabeth invited me to lunch. The Mexican restaurant we were going to meet up at is in the heart of our little town – a mere two miles from home so I decided to ride my bike instead of drive.
When I think back on it, if I hadn’t stopped at the Park to shoot a few shots of some kids throwing Frisbees, I wouldn’t have been running late. I wouldn’t have taken the short cut down the alley, and I would be writing this entry about Frisbee throwers in the park - not about the Red Door.
Here’s what happened…
My town is small but not so small that I know every side street and alley.
I had lost track of time and was running a good 15 minutes late for lunch. In an attempt to cut my travel time, I took a short cut down an alley that I’d never traveled down which I figured would drop me on the next street over.
Brick walls lined both sides of the alley – the back sides of small shops. A trash dumpster was half down the alley against the wall to my right. The alley itself was clear and easy to navigate so I was peddling pretty fast when a door on the left wall caught my eye.
Things were still fine until I got close enough to see the details of the door and that’s when everything started happening.
First, I was so intent on that door that I almost crashed into the dumpster. I swerved to avoid it and almost lost control of the bike. I stopped short and stared at the door.
Suddenly, I felt dizzy – like I was going to pass out. My heart started racing and my mouth went dry. I felt like something really bad was getting ready to happen and I just wanted to run. But I stood there rooted like a deer in headlights.
Someone blowing their horn on the main road snapped me out of the trance and with very shaky legs I rode the bike out of the alley.
After two Margarettas and lunch, I was pretty much back to normal. By then, Elizabeth had almost convinced me that I had been over heated and probably had a low blood sugar from not eating breakfast so I had gotten shaky. She’s a ‘get back on the horse that threw you’ kind of girl. She said that I needed to face my fears or they’d get the best of me. So, she talked me into going back after lunch to take a picture of the door.
I agreed, but with the stipulation that we go back in her car. I wasn’t ready to ride down that alley again. Not yet anyway. So we put my bike on her bike rack, climbed into her car and headed back to ‘the door’.
As soon as she turned down the alley I started feeling nervous and by the time she stopped in front of the door it started happening all over again – the dizziness, the racing heart, everything.
I wanted to just get away from there but she snatched up my camera, climbed out of the car and took some shots of the door first.
On the way home she said she thought that I was having a panic attack. But for the life of me I can’t figure out why.
Later in the evening when I finally got up the nerve to look at the pictures on my computer I once again started feeling apprehensive, but not nearly with the same intensity as when I was standing in front of the door.
Analyzing the pictures, the biggest thing that creeps me out about the door is the fact that there is no handle to open it with. And there is a light switch outside the door but no light. Why have the switch outside for a light that is inside if you can’t open the door to go in after you turn it on?
I have a big phobia about being inside a locked room that has no windows in it. And I can’t ride in elevators.
Maybe it’s because even though it is an outside door, it looks like an inside door – one that has no handle to get out. Maybe that’s what creeps me out.
It’s just a door.
Nothing to be afraid of. Right?
The Red Door
Jewels
