Most people, if they are locked in the bathroom, have done it themselves and on purpose. I did not. I got locked in by a malfunctioning doorknob that detached itself from its stem, so that the mechanism did not turn the little tongue that latches in the door. I was on the inside, very grateful that I’d taken my clothes in with me when I went to shower, and my son was on the outside. This turned out to be a Very Good Thing(tm).
First I had him send a small screwdriver under the door, which I used to disassemble the knob. That’s how I figured out what was wrong with it. Unfortunately, I couldn’t make it right. So I had my boychick get a big screwdriver, put it in the mechanism, and attempt to turn it. No luck; he hasn’t the hand strength. So I bade him get the phone, and talked himi through calling his best friend’s mom. He got her voice mail, and left a message that sounded like he was narrating a scene of doom and disaster. Have I mentioned that this kid loves to dramatize anything? But really, I was enormously proud of him; he’s never dialed the phone or spoken to anyone without an adult to preceed him, and he managed it quite well.
Next I tried to go out the window. The screen came out very easily, but that was the end of my success. I suppose I’d have fit had I been willing to dive out the window headfirst, but for any sort of climb not calculated to do more harm than good, my dimensions exceed window tolerances. I’m still stuck. Our son, though, worried that the attempt was dangerous, had brought the small step-ladder around and put it under the window. It wasn’t high enough for me to put a foot on (which would have made window-egress much more feasible), but it was high enough that he could climb up and reach the window to hand me things. Now I could get tools larger than those that could fit under that dratted door!
I had him hand me the phone through the window. No luck reaching anyone. I got my husband somewhat later, who said he didn’t know what he could do anyway. (Oh, get and axe out of the garage and commit an act of demolition? No, maybe not such a good idea….) Ok….I had my son bring me a large screwdriver; he couldn’t find the hammer, but my shoe was a good fake. I dismantled the hinges. Trouble is, I still lacked leverage to knock the door off same toward the inside of the room, and when I told my son to throw himself at it as hard as he liked, it didn’t work. Ah, but now I had a large screwdriver and a small one. A twist here, a yank there using the handle as a hook, and the latch assembly gave. Freedom beckoned. I put the hinges back together before I accepted the invitation, lest the door fall on the head of an unwary child, either human or feline, and sallied forth into the rest of the house. And you know, all I could think of as I tried to figure out how to fit myself out the window was that if it succeeded, our one bathroom house would be a no bathroom house until it was fixed…and that doing so would probably require going back in through that same window.
I was never able to use the defense of laches that successfully….