One Night in Hell

Geneva living this way, lived that way in central Adelaide myself, and have encountered numerous country folk doing the same over the years. I don't know who's the more foolish in the end, the one who locks the world out (for fear of unwanted company) or the one who lets it in (embracing it)?

There are certainly areas, parts of towns, where an open door is tantamount to an invitation to others, to partake of all my worldly goods (and depart with them). But perhaps it's a mistaken notion to assume that the quality of life is inherently characterised by these pockets of rampant communal abuse. Perhaps many areas are not like that at all.

Certainly a part of me has always felt that most people so bold as to try the door for uninvited entry, will either pose no threat, or if they do, have arrived equipped for a break and entry on the assumption of a locked portal. Thus perhaps the paranoia surrounding us, works slightly in our favour, projecting the illusion that a door is locked when it is simply closed – realy our expectations at work. How common is the opportune thief, who is bold enough to try a door handle uninvited, and yet not equipped (in mind or body) to cope with its expected status of locked? Rare enough, in the experience of many, to make an open door policy literally workable in many, perhaps most, places.