Jingle Jangle

This evening, a strange occurrence happened that I don’t have much of an answer for. Gavin was working late, so I was home alone making dinner and running around the house switching from dusting the dining room table to doing laundry. In-between stirring the spinach in the skillet, I heard the bell on the back storm door jingle. It helps notify us of incoming visitors. That’s weird, I thought. It’s probably just the wind but I trudged the steps and looked around the patio. Everything seemed undisturbed. It was a still evening without a breeze, yet the clapper of the bell swung lightly from side to side. I resumed my tasks back downstairs until about fifteen minutes later, “ding, ding-ding, ding ding.“

Again, I climbed the steps and looked at the latch. I could have sworn I pulled it tight but it had moved to the frame of the door instead. I pulled hard, ensuring this time, it was latched without a doubt. I returned to my tasks.

Dishing up the food a bit later, I was putting the plates on the table when, yet again, “ding, ding-ding, ding ding,” jingled faintly upstairs. You’ve got to be kidding me.

I felt like someone was extremely amused watching me climb up and down the stairs completely perplexed. I checked the latch. It had moved again to the frame of the door. I pulled to secure the latch for the third time and pressed on the door, hard. There was no way the wind or the cats pawing at the door could move the latch & if it had slipped off, the door would swing all the way open.

Normally, I’d be scared with something like this happening but oddly I felt the lightheartedness of whatever it was that was fooling me.

Gavin got home later and we were in the kitchen talking. Just as I was in the middle of telling him the story of what had happened not once, twice but three times, I suddenly froze mid-sentence. . .

“Ding, ding-ding, ding ding.”