If you have to go to court in Alpena County, there’s a good chance you’re going to bump into a door.
On the top floor of the county’s lovely courthouse, a dignified, walnut-trimmed courtroom with art deco vibes and iffy acoustics hosts an ever-moving stream of people from all walks of life.
In my just shy of four years of hanging out in that courtroom, I’ve watched lots of those people bonk into the door.
It’s not their fault. Anyone presented with wooden double doors and needing to get to the other side of them would probably assume those doors would both open.
Not in the 26th Circuit Court courtroom, where the left-hand door — or the right-hand door, if you’re trying to leave — is always locked.
When I asked about the locked door several years ago, the court folks shrugged and said that’s just what they’ve always done.
Many’s the time I’ve watched a courtroom visitor push on the locked door at the end of a hearing, only to look around in bewilderment when the door wouldn't open.
People whack their knees on the door, knock into it with their shoulder, or stand outside the courtroom uncertainly, wondering why they’re locked out.
A few months ago, after substantial pestering from a certain reporter we don’t need to name, the judge on the bench used a break in a busy court day to give me the OK to — insert drum roll here — unlock the locked door.
With a click, the metal rod holding it shut slid back, and the door swung outward.
Now gloriously wide, the doorway stood open and inviting, its two doors swinging freely and no longer a bonk-hazard.
Gotta say, it was a nice moment.
As the doors closed, the once-locked door skidded against its partner, the doors’ edges improperly aligned so they wouldn’t both close without an extra tug.
Court staff nodded and aha-ed. So this was why the door had been locked.
At a nod from the judge, the bailiff re-locked the door, and the next hearing began.
Possibly, the troublemaking door could be rehung, or its edge could be sanded and refinished so both doors swing smoothly.
Possibly, the court could decide to put up with doors that don’t close properly to make the courtroom more accessible to everyone.
But, at least for now, the door remains locked on court days, and people keep bonking into it.
Courtrooms ain’t the only place where people keep doing things because they’ve always done them that way.
And they ain’t the only place where it’s easier to let a problem be than to fix it.
I hope I’m not the only person who will walk past a protruding nail in my house for years before taking eight seconds to whack it flat with a hammer.
When I ignore the pile of paperwork I keep meaning to put away or never reach the tomorrow on which I will start healthier behaviors, I’m cheating my future self.
More harmful, though, are the doors I don’t fix so that others don’t bonk into them.
Like when I mean to kick my habit of putting my own feelings first but continue dragging my self-absorption like a shroud, shedding stress in my wake.
Or when I see ills around me and think someone should take a stand against them, forgetting that I could be that someone.
Or when I love some people but keep one door locked against others, unwilling to forgive imagined slights or accept people who don’t look like me, dress like me, think like me.
God doesn’t do locked doors.
While humans bicker and fuss and lock doors against one another, He made sure anyone — ANYone — can get to him.
With a cross and an empty grave, He not only fixed the door, He ripped it off.
We can walk right into the courtroom, where the Judge calls us utterly unworthy of freedom, then removes our shackles and pulls us to Him in a welcoming embrace.
With all my good intentions, I know I’ll keep pushing doors shut, afraid of change, afraid of trying, afraid of doing the hard work of keeping my heart and hands open to the world God gave me to love.
And my eternally patient Father will keep loving the heck out of me, anyway, walking beside me as I go and do and open doors.
