The Lock

This is a true story.

On the campus of Sam Houston State University, outside the Lee Drain Building (between AB4 and the ROTC/former Dance building) there is a bike rack with a lock on it with no bike attached.

Now, that lock has been there for a long time - since I was a student at Sam Houston State.  While walking around the campus with Kristi and the kids this weekend, I saw this lock and couldn't believe that it's still there.  It's been almost 15 years, after all, and it hasn't moved.  A building has been torn down and another built right next to it.  And countless bikes have been locked up to the rack right next to it.  I wonder how many people have ever even noticed this lock sitting there, protecting nothing but the pole it's attached to?

I know it's been there since 1997 because it's my lock.

One day I borrowed Kristi's bike to ride to class on, and I locked up her bike in this very spot.  Or at least I thought I had.  It turns out that I had apparently only looped the lock around the bike rack pole and not around the bike frame.  And when I returned for the bike later that day, it was gone.

I'm not quite sure why I left the lock there, but I never went back for it.  And it stayed right there.  I always assumed that the university would just cut it off the pole, but I guess that never reached the top of the priority list.

And there it sits today.  I probably still have the key in storage somewhere, but I'm just going to leave it.  I'm curious how long it will remain there.  Will it still be there when my kids are students there?  Or grandkids?  I picked up the lock, and it's still very firmly locked.  Despite the rust, I'm almost positive that the key would unlock it.  but where's the fun - and the mystery - in that?  For all I know there's an urban legend on campus surrounding this fixture on the SHSU campus.  Or would anyone even notice if one day the lock was just gone?

It's just another part of my legacy, I guess.