Key hol(o) ?

Our house is a classical black hole. If anything is lost, there are zilch chances that it will be found, ever. The blame goes to the disorganised and apologetic-only-when-cornered members of the household, who are in a majority of 2:1. To add insult to injury, as if it were not enough that I was congenitally disorganised, now I forget things double quick as well.  Like the other day I was filling up the bucket for soaking clothes, had already put the detergent and had just opened the tap, when   somebody rang the door bell. I went to open the door, and then never went back to the bathroom. I would   rather not disclose the gory details of the aftermath, both in terms of physical (overflowing bathroom floor, depleted overhead tank) and verbal (domestic, what else?) abuse, an old gal has to have some self respect left or what!!.

The gravity of   my forgetfulness hit me very hard a month ago. We had taken possession of a flat, and as usual, there was a master set of keys and a duplicate set of keys. We have no immediate plans of shifting to the back- of -beyond locality, it will be a good 35 KM from my office one way, and if we do, I doubt very much if the cantankerous Administration in my office will not raise the very valid issue of wastage of sarkari fuel to ferry me to and fro home.

Now I am not at all a typical trust-worthy house-proud organised wife, and who now knows it better than my dear husband (DH)?

DH is a vey methodical soul (God bless him!). It was a Sunday. He put the keys in different key rings and pouches, and was informing me seriously about what was what and what went where, while I was too engrossed in the juicy supplement of the Sunday newspaper, but I remembered to nod my head on cue, at least that is what I think I did, not at all too sure now!!

Thereafter the whole episode of keys was swept off my memory. Did Sherlock Holmes not advise that one should never burden one’s grey cells with redundant information? Everything that Holmes said can not be trusted blindly, as I learnt to my great chagrin.

The pouch of master keys travelled to DH’s office and back in the black leather pouch, kept in the briefcase. One fine day he decided that he would engage a carpenter to do some basic woodwork at least, and looked for the duplicate key. He asked me, did I not give them to you? As usual, I drew a blank. I could not even remember what the pouch/bag/container containing duplicate keys looked like. Sometimes I thought it was a grey airlines pouch…hang on…. was it not a  black velvet potli bag … … wait a minute I distinctly remember it was a plastic red  baby time tiffin box of my son… the mental picture kept varying so much so that I started believing in all of them and getting jittery by the moment.  

Still no fret, I bravely assured him. I will look for it. Well I did!! Upon God!! Every weekend since last month, I have been doing spring cleaning in the height of Delhi Winter, targeting one cupboard /drawer at a time, and dropping dead tired and exhausted when even a baby dress embroidered by my mother for her six month old grand son, (who incidentally is now biting his nails in anxiety for imminent  XII Boards)  tumbled out, but no sign of those $#&@ keys. The tension was palpable. What if the keys had fallen into wrong hands?

DH too began to hallucinate about those duplicate keys…did he take them to the flat and left there by mistake? Did he keep the pouch on a sill outside the car and forgot to place them back? He could not sleep, the worry lines on his forehead deepened. He went to a chaabiwala to get duplicate keys made, it was a ‘new generation super-safe’ kind of keys, not in the roadside chaabiwala’s  competence… at last a proficient one was located, who made the duplicate keys tentatively, some of which turned, but the main door key still would not turn… apparently the chaabiwala had to go physically to the flat for  the high precision work. There the matter rested…tense, sad, worried…. till this morning.

I have an official meeting in the evening followed by dinner which I can not avoid, and will have to go straight from Office. So I decided to change my jewellery in the morning and took out the case from the almirah. There was this black velvet potli pouch ( yes yes yes…one of the mental visions I had of the container was indeed right) sitting snug inside the jewellery case… it felt heavy… I looked in…..and there were these duplicate keys…all 12 or 13 of them…imagine!! Only I must have kept them there…but I had absolutely no recollection of doing so!!

All’s well that ends well… keeping my fingers crossed…