"Outside Looking In" is an occasional series chronicling my persistent inability to remember my keys when leaving my apartments, past and present.
Year: 2002
Location: Annecy, France
During my second summer in Annecy, I found a studio downtown on Rue Jean Jaurès. It was on the third floor of a relatively modern building equipped with an elevator(!). The apartment itself was kind of a shithole, but it had a balcony with sliding glass doors, which made up for the peeling walls in the bathroom, mysteriously stained rugs, threadbare mattress and broken bedframe. Another plus, or so I thought, was that the door was self-locking. Initially, it made me feel more secure. In the end, this door fucked me. Repeatedly.
The keys to said studio were attached to an obnoxiously large plush cow named Elvis. Elvis doubled as a change purse. He, along with my keys, infrequently made it out of the apartment.
Year: 2002
Location: Annecy, France
During my second summer in Annecy, I found a studio downtown on Rue Jean Jaurès. It was on the third floor of a relatively modern building equipped with an elevator(!). The apartment itself was kind of a shithole, but it had a balcony with sliding glass doors, which made up for the peeling walls in the bathroom, mysteriously stained rugs, threadbare mattress and broken bedframe. Another plus, or so I thought, was that the door was self-locking. Initially, it made me feel more secure. In the end, this door fucked me. Repeatedly.
The keys to said studio were attached to an obnoxiously large plush cow named Elvis. Elvis doubled as a change purse. He, along with my keys, infrequently made it out of the apartment.
The first time I realized I had abandoned my keys inside my place, I was hysterical. It is such a helpless, awful feeling the first time you realize that you cannot get into your own apartment. I called my landlord to explain the situation in my pitiful French. He asked if I left any widows open. I developed the habit of leaving the sliding glass door leading to the balcony unlocked and open at all times. Any rational person would realize that this negates the safety provided by a self-locking door. This insight was lost on me. And thank god it was! Because all my landlord needed to do was strap an enormous ladder to his Peugeot, scale the building, and let me in. The whole process was relatively short and painless. For me, anyway. He was not amused.
I wish I could say that I stopped locking myself out from then on. But, sadly that's not the case. I must have done it on at least two other occasions that very summer. Luckily I befriended my neighbor, a charming old woman who was intrigued by my unabashed American-ness. Out of the goodness of her heart, she would let me go out onto her balcony, climb across her flower bed, and jump the gap between my balcony and hers.
This was the beginning of a very long (and still ongoing) career in locking myself out of nearly every apartment I've lived in thus far.
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