This one's a KEYper

The other night I was walking home after judging a speech competition, where 12 out 14 speeches were on "Unity and Diversity." Anyway, I have an hour and a half before I have to teach, so I'm thinking about eating dinner, surfing the internet, and relaxing, as it'd been a stressful 24 hours. I put the key in the lock, turn the key, and right as I'm about to give my door the obligatory shoulder shove, my key breaks and I'm left holding the base of the now severed key, while the lock has taken captive of the other end. I'm actually pretty calm about the situation at first, feeling shocked and mildly amused. I've always wondered what would happen if a key broke in my hand. And then it occured to me that it's already after 6:00, and all the school offices are closed. And worst of all, all the phone numbers I need in a situation like this are safely locked away inside my apartment.

I begin walking toward the Foreign Affairs Office (FAO), hoping someone is still there. I climb up to the seventh floor, knock on the door, and am greeted with silence and dark hallways. Not knowing what I should do, I head back to the speech competitions (they're still going on) to ask another foreign teacher if she has anyone's number from the FAO. But before I get to her, the organizer of the event asks if I had time to do more judging. I don't say much, holding up my broken key in protest. He gets the point and asks Mr. Wang to help me. Mr. Wang speaks some Russian but no English, so I'm not sure how this will turn out. After a few minutes and a few phonecalls, Mr. Wang manages to track down someone who has access to a ladder and power tools. Mr. Wang climbs into my apartment, unlocks the door, and we sit in an awkward silence waiting for the other gentleman to return. When he does, he takes apart my lock, dislodges the key, and both men leave by 7:00. At 7:20 there's a knock at my door. It's the lock man again. He's arrived with a new key and he puts my lock back on the door. After all this, I managed to get to my class ontime. Thankfully, I had already planned my lesson.

The next morning I have to wake up early for my language class. I needed to water Cayce's plants, so I leave my apartment in my pajamas, only planning to be there as long as it takes to water five plants. I'm on my way back to my apartment, fumbling for my keys when I realize that I didn't put the new key on my keychain last night. This time I'm panicking. I'm in my pjs, I'm locked out of my apartment, and I have people coming to my place in under an hour. I turn around and walk back up to Cayce's apartment to call someone from the FAO. It's 7:45. Amy tells me she can get me the keys by 7:55, but I need to meet her infront of the lab building. As it's my only option, I obey her commands. I remember advice I was given about clothing: you can get away with wearing anything, as long as you're confident wearing it. But can I really be comfortable walking across campus in my UConn scrubs and the newly acquired pink sweatshirt I bought for the upcoming pink party and only purchased it because of it's tacky hideousness? I'm already an easy target for stares and whispers; I don't need anything else to draw attention to myself. But I have no choice. I arrive by 7:55, but Amy is not there. So I sit and wait for her, as hundreds of students are walking by, hurrying to class. I even see a few of my students pass and try my best nonchalant "hello"s. Alas Amy arrives, and I hurry home trying to pretend that none of that happened.