Okay. So when we last left the saga of Mark's Garage Door, the top of its frame had suddenly and tragically split in two, rendering it useless insofar as opening and closing was concerned. In other words, the thing was broken. This occurred the evening of February 28. The afternoon of March 1, a man came by from the garage door company and — with the kind of perception that distinguishes a true craftsperson from the rest of us layfolks — looked at the split wooden frame and ventured the professional opinion that the door was broken. Following a bit of math, it was further determined that, given what it would cost to repair, I might as well kick in a few more bucks and get a whole new door. I've been arranging for the garage to be re-roofed so a new door would fit right in. (The new sign of status in Southern California is no longer that you have a development deal or a hit movie or series. It's that you have a roofer coming.)
I wanted the door installed as soon as possible. In my neighborhood, there are all sorts of complex rules: You can't park on the North side of the street between 8 AM and 10 AM on a Wednesday unless you have a certain sticker on your car, in which case you can park on the South side on Tuesdays and Thursday between Noon and 2 PM except during a total eclipse or if you bought the car from a guy named Artie…something like that. Anyway, it's much simpler for me, to say nothing of convenient, to be able to park in my garage. This, I could not do until the new door was installed. The Garage Door Man assured me this could be done the following Friday (3/4) or, at the latest, the Tuesday after that (3/8). I gave him a deposit and he said that as soon as they knew when the new door was ready, they'd give me a call — like, the night before — so I could be here then.
All week, I played the little, annoying game of parking on the street, figuring out where to leave my car at night. Thursday evening, I received no call. I cancelled an appointment on Friday so I could be here, just in case, but I didn't hear from them all day…which meant that parking on the street would continue throughout the three-day weekend. Monday, I called to ask if, as promised, I would be receiving my new garage door on Tuesday. No one at the garage door company seemed able to tell me yea or nay.
First thing Tuesday morning, I phoned and politely demanded to know if and when that day, my new garage door would be installed. I spoke to a succession of people who did not know, each of whom transferred my call to someone else who did not know. When finally my query arrived at the owner of the company, I was informed that they had no record of my order. The new door had not been made. No one was scheduled to come out to my place that day. They didn't doubt that I had ordered it and paid a deposit but, frustratingly, they would have to send someone out to re-measure the door and begin the process of making me a door and it might take another week and…well, you can just imagine how delighted I was with the situation. Fume, snarl, pout.
Five minutes later, the proprietor called me back with a wild theory. They had no current paperwork on my order, true. But was it possible that this was because it had already been filed? That the door had already been installed? I told them this seemed unlikely since no one from their company had ever phoned to say they wanted to come over, and I had not been away from the house much in the previous week. Still, it was not a metaphysical impossibility. My house is on a corner and my garage does not face the same street as my front door. I realized I had not driven past or walked by my garage in several days.
So my friend Carolyn and I went out and looked…and sure enough, there was a new garage door on my garage. Further consultation with the company yielded the data that it had been installed the previous Friday, perhaps even while I was home. Instead of calling ahead or even knocking on my front door when they got here, the installers had just gone in, taken the old door off and put in the new one without telling me. I'd been doing the park-on-the-street shuffle for days when I could have been opening my new door and parking in my old garage.
I felt an odd mix of emotions: Pleased was I that the garage door problem was behind me…but annoyed was I that it had been resolved four days earlier and no one had told me. The gent at the garage door company was embarrassed, and also puzzled to find himself apologizing that his men had done a job when they'd said they were going to do it.
So anyway, let this be a lesson to you all. I'm not sure what you might learn from it but let it be a lesson of something to you. Maybe it's that before you complain that they haven't installed your new garage door, you ought to go out and check to see if they've installed your new garage door. Or something like that. Anyway, today's the day when a different outfit is supposed to begin putting a new roof on that garage. But I haven't heard a word from them so maybe they've already done it.