Breaking and entering
Jul. 23rd, 2009 09:01 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jmc_bksThis morning my neighbor locked herself out of her home when she went running. So she knocked on my door at 5:30am -- because my house was the only one on the block with lights on.
Did I have a ladder? No, just a two-step stepping stool. Could I boost her up? No, too high. But we double checked, just in case.
Twenty-four hour locksmiths? Not so much -- after three tries, we found what appeared to be an answering service that promised a call-back within five minutes. Nope, never called back.
We ended up borrowing a tall ladder from another neighbor. As I braced the ladder so she could boost herself up onto the roof, I thought for a moment that it was a good thing we were both white, otherwise we too could have ended up like Dr. Henry Louis Gates, arrested as we tried to get her into her own home. We live in a mostly white neighborhood in a predominantly black city. Would one of our neighbors have called the police if they'd noticed us skulking around in the alley? I don't know. Certainly she in her running gear and me in a ratty old sundress with bedhead did not look threatening...but neither did Dr. Gates.
Did I have a ladder? No, just a two-step stepping stool. Could I boost her up? No, too high. But we double checked, just in case.
Twenty-four hour locksmiths? Not so much -- after three tries, we found what appeared to be an answering service that promised a call-back within five minutes. Nope, never called back.
We ended up borrowing a tall ladder from another neighbor. As I braced the ladder so she could boost herself up onto the roof, I thought for a moment that it was a good thing we were both white, otherwise we too could have ended up like Dr. Henry Louis Gates, arrested as we tried to get her into her own home. We live in a mostly white neighborhood in a predominantly black city. Would one of our neighbors have called the police if they'd noticed us skulking around in the alley? I don't know. Certainly she in her running gear and me in a ratty old sundress with bedhead did not look threatening...but neither did Dr. Gates.
