Why Can’t He Shut a Door?

The Boston Herald

He has a million good points. He makes me laugh. He cleans up after the dog when I gag and say I can’t. He takes the laundry to the dry cleaner. He never overreacts when I write a check or 10 and forget to copy the amount in the check register. He tells me I look good even when I don’t. He gives me his coat when I’m cold. And he gave me his car because it came with a Global Positioning System and I’m the one who can’t find my way out of a paper bag. But his best point is that he never, ever says, even when I get lost with the GPS system, “What is wrong with you?” though these are the exact words I say to him every time he forgets to shut a door.

He has this thing with doors. Refrigerator. Closet. Cabinet. Front door. Back door. Cellar door. He doesn’t shut them. He doesn’t seem to remember that they have to BE shut. Maybe it’s psychological. He doesn’t like endings? He’s not into closing the door on anything?

Or maybe it’s a form of rebellion. Did his father do to him what he did to our son when he slammed a door so hard that a clock fell off the wall and broke. “Come here and learn how to close a door correctly,” he said that day, all calm and resolve. And for 15 minutes, this boy who was 7 or 8, opened and closed the door he had slammed, slowly and gently.

Maybe it’s genetic. Are there other family members who do not shut doors? A distant uncle? A cousin? Once I didn’t shut an overhead kitchen cabinet at my Aunt Lorraine’s house and she turned the air blue yelling at me because she walked into it and banged her head. I have closed all doors since. But I’m not genetically related to this man who doesn’t shut doors. So maybe it’s just a quirk, like a sole French fry mixed in with a plate of onion rings.

It’s not that my husband deliberately leaves doors open to annoy me. At least I hope not.  It’s more like he has a disconnect. He opens the front door to get the newspaper, which is never at the front door anymore but almost always in the middle of the yard.  And instead of shutting the door behind him, the normal thing to do, he leaves it wide open, letting the freezing air in.

“Please close the door,” I say to him every morning. And he says “Uh huh” but doesn’t.  

Same thing with the garage door. “Don’t forget to close the garage door when you leave” I say. And he says, “Uh huh,” and backs out of the driveway and zooms away. 

“What is wrong with you?” I say when I call to tell him that he left the garage door open again.  

“I did? I didn’t mean to. I’m sorry. ”  

And the thing is, he is.        

If he lets the dog out, he leaves the back door open. If he’s been in the cellar, that door is left open wide. If he’s watching a DVD, there’s a gaping hole where two pieces of a glass door should be. And worse – worse – he never remembers to close his closet door.

It’s not just that his closet is a mess. What do I care? Mine is, too.

But his is cedar lined.

“The cedar does no good if you leave the door open,” I tell him.

“Uh huh,” he says.  

“You’re going to get moths. Your sweaters are going to have holes.”

“Uh huh,” he replies.

There’s an old expression: When God shuts a door, He opens a window.

In my house, when my husband shuts a door, it’s a miracle.