Rules of the House: No Slamming Doors

I sit right next to our office door at work. I hide behind a little hutch on my desk so people don’t automatically see me and they think to look over at the Staff Assistant to be helped – or taller people completely ignore the Staff Assistant and poke their uncomfortably smiley heads over my hutch and stare at me to help them. That’s when I put on my smiley face, stand up, and try not to be flustered by their hovering presence.

The main reason I bring my desk location up is because our door opens and closes a lot. Congress is currently in Recess, so no one’s really around these days for meetings or Capitol tours, which means our door is opening and closing much less frequently, though our staff members still walk through quite often. Thus, I hear a lot of comings and goings.

The problem with this is that I don’t exactly enjoy the sound a door makes when people close it. Particularly because most people don’t anticipate the general swing of a door, so they almost always slam it, at least a little. Right next to my desk.

Worse still, when a window’s open in our office, or the main doors down the hallway are open to the outside, we get a sort of wind tunnel motion that either pushes the door to stay open (I don’t mind that one quite as much), or pulls it closed with even more force (bah humbug, I say to that).

Everyone in our office has a different way of closing the door. One person is generally softer and the door doesn’t end up closing, so someone else gets up to close it a few minutes later. Another throws it back behind him, not caring that I’m getting an irregular heartbeat from every time my heart skips as the door slams closed, sometimes more forcefully than others. And another takes about 10 minutes to close the door because he hates the sound of doors slamming as well, so he makes sure never to make any sort of sound when he closes it. I appreciate that person the most.

I’ve gotten to the point where I can often guess who’s entering or leaving our office based on how the door closes, without peeping above my hutch to see them. Some days I’m spot on. Of course, sometimes I’m completely wrong, which I guess what I’m trying to say is that it’s not an exact science, but whatever.

All of this to say that you might be seeing a post soon about how I lost my job one because I beat up a colleague in the office after the 500,000^th door slam. It’s one particular colleague who should be fearful of me (see example #2 to paragraphs up). It’s the worst when I’m not paying attention, so I don’t recognize that I need to cover my ears in preparation for his exit or entrance. 

It’s a shock like a firework you didn’t know was being set off right next to you, but without any of the pretty lights and excitement. Sometimes I jump like I was just shot at. I’m surprised more curse words haven’t flown out of my mouth. Generally, a muttered “Yikes!” or “Sheesh!” or “Bah!” gets me settled.

But one day, my soothing words aren’t going to do the job, and when that day comes, look for a post with a picture of a guy nursing a sweet black eye. He’ll learn what slamming doors will get’cha. One day, he’ll learn.

Don’t mess with Towanda*.

(*Fried Green Tomatoes – classic.)