The other day I was entering a building at my university. Naturally, there was a door in the way. I consider myself well-educated, and don’t have too much trouble opening doors. If it’s tricky, you can try various twist/turn and push/pull combinations. It’s not rocket science.

What did I see next to door as I approached? C’mon, guess.

I saw a sign with instructions on how to open the door.

Push button, pull handle.

What the?!?! Someone explain this! This is a university! I can only wonder what kind of people are they letting in here.

My faith in humanity is gone…

How to open a door in two easy steps: Build up speed. Hit it.

When opening door a door this way, you should try to hit with three points of your body at the same time to reduce the impact shock: the side of your thigh, the side of your hip and the back of your shoulder.

This allows you to open a range of different doors without severe bodily harm. Unfortunately it is impossible to say generally if the lock or the hinges will give in first.

Wait, you wanted to open an unlocked door? Never mind.

One of the most interesting objects at the place where I worked must have been one of the doors in the west wing main corridor. The interesting thing about it was that I could never seem to get it open, but everybody else could. At first, it didn’t really bother me – I was pretty much indifferent to this door, but then it seemed that I was being ostracized from everybody else simply because I couldn’t open this damned door. Eventually, I decided to try to figure out how to open it. I would watch others go in and out in attempt to see what their secret was, I would then perform the exact same procedure on the door, and yet, it still wouldn’t open for me. I would stand there for hours staring at it, waiting for some sort of answer to pop up. Everyone would laugh at my feeble attempts at opening it, and some would even insult me. I couldn’t do anything back, though, there were too many of them.

Eventually, I got so angry at this door that I tried breaking it down with force. However, no matter how hard I tried, it just wouldn’t open. I would constantly cry over it, it seems that something so trivial to me had suddenly become my life goal. Sometimes people would walk by and see my depression and frustration, and feel sorry for me. They’d open the door for me, and I would be able to go in. Inside, there were many people around, doing all sorts of things. I didn’t know many of these people, but they seemed friendly and I felt accepted. Before long, however, someone who already knew me would come along and tell everybody about how there was no way I could open the door, then I would get banished once again. The person who originally helped me in wouldn’t help me anymore because everybody seemed to be horrible to him for letting me in. After this would happen, I would feel so guilty and horrible. I would just crawl into a corner and cry.

One day, I managed to stay in the room behind the door for a long time. I decided to put on a disguise so that those who already knew me wouldn’t be able to catch me, and those who didn’t wouldn’t be able to see my oddities and determine that there was no way I could have got in without help. I was happy, for a while. Then it all started again, people started ostracizing me, less would talk to me, everybody would call me a “weirdo.” I honestly don’t know what it was that I did to make me seem like a bad person, but I guess I was. I mean, if everyone else thought I was a bad person – then that makes me a bad person, right? I got banished again. This was horrible; I couldn’t stop feeling sorrow and guilt. This went on for many months. It seemed that I just couldn’t get rid of the horrible void inside of me. It seemed that the sorrow just made me even more eccentric, and people would laugh at me even more.

Then I decided to give up on the door, I decided that I was better than everyone else. “I don’t need this door – I’m too good for it” I would tell myself, but inside I always wanted everybody else to like me so would always be tempted to try opening the door again. Sometimes, I would try to open it again, and try not to get caught failing at it – but I would always fail. I decided to ignore the door and just act like someone who was able to open it, that way people would accept me, but it seemed that no matter how hard I tried, there was always one mistake I made that made people realise I was an ‘outsider.’ After this, I accepted that I’d never be like everybody else – and that meant I was better than all of them. So I decided to be the one insulting and belittling them, I would do this a lot, some people found it funny, but some seemed to think I was in the wrong, even though if it was me who was the victim, it seemed that they could never be in the wrong.

To this day I still think about the door in the main corridor of the west wing, and how I could never open it. I would be able to remember what it looked like exactly – every detail, and would still try to figure out how to open it in my head, but there always seemed to be something there that I was blind to.

What do I do now? It seems that I became so good at pretending to be somebody else from all of the attempts to emulate someone who could open the door that I became an actor. I make a lot of money; but I’m still the lonely, depressed, unwanted child in a man’s body that I have always been.

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