Wednesday, July 27, 2022

The Way We Were Wednesday : The Front Door


When the house I grew up in, was being finished in the early 1960's, someone lost the keys to the front door.  We always came and went through the kitchen door, that was on the side of the house.  My parents owned that house about 20 years, before selling/giving it to my sister, and they never had keys for the front door.  It was rare, very rare for anyone to enter through the front door, the car insurance salesman.  The police the night my middle brother totaled a car a couple of miles up the road (and walked away, got a ticket for leaving the scene of an accident.) 

We never really thought much about it.  There was a back and forth with the builder and the people who did the final finish, but when that yielded no key, nothing was ever done.  

The house was locked when we were away, we had keys to the kitchen door, but a copy of that key was hidden in a vent pipe in the garage wall. Friends knew where the key was.  That is just way it was.  The garage was seldom locked.  

Was there a door to your childhood home that no one had a key to? Did you come and go through the front door? 


16 comments:

  1. We used the front door mostly at our house. At the apartment, there was no other option. And, no, everyone had a key (or two). Funny that your family never had the lock changed on that front door.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I thought of this recently and wondered if it was weird

      Delete
  2. Anonymous7/27/2022

    The farmhouse where I mostly grew up had no keys, so doors were never locked. Apparently every Australian knows the safest place to leave a key to their house for someone else is under the front door mat. Oddly house burglars don't seem to know this.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In a car, it is above the sun visor, or in the ashtray (cars don't have those anymore do they?)

      Delete
  3. We always entered the front door, because otherwise it was through the gate around the back and into the house that way. The front was always easier.
    And like Mitchell, I wondered why y'all never changed the lock, but I guess you just get used to things.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. My father was a master procrastinator on things that didn't matter to him, like home repairs that were not critical, and it cost money for something he never used.

      Delete
  4. We entered through both the front and back door. We had keys to everything. But in those old timey days in our small town, our doors were never locked unless we went out of town for more than a day or so.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Most of farmers around left the keys in their trucks all the time,

      Delete
  5. I never owned a key to any of our houses growing up. Someone was usually home at all times. The front door was the usual access because the back door was always, well, in the back and fenced in. Backdoor usage was there for when we were in the back yard, or if nobody was home. No hidden keys anywhere. The doors were locked only at night. I married into a family who locked doors even when home. I've been following suit for forty-seven years and counting.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. 47 years of doing things the right way (hahahahahaha)

      Delete
  6. We always mostly used the backdoor at the ancestral home....and still do. We have a key box with the front and back door keys hidden outside just in case we ever get locked out by mistake.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. we have both locked ourself out of the condo, security has a key

      Delete
  7. We use kitchen door when I grew up. My mom said only tramps and sale people uses the front door.
    coffee is on and stay safe

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. She's right Dora! LMAO!!!!!

      Delete
    2. I think my father would have agreed

      Delete
  8. We have 4 entrances to our house, but almost exclusively use the garage entrance.

    Sassybear
    https://idleeyesandadormy.com/

    ReplyDelete