Even though I have worked in the same building for six years, I haven’t stopped looking for secret doors.
While now I spend most of my time in a small windowless room at the back of the building as a full-time web developer, it was not always so. My first role was as a science presenter and general operations staff. It was my part-time job while I studied at university. Floor staff get to see a lot of hidden doors.
Two years into my work I discovered a service door leading to a narrow crawlspace behind our rotating perception tunnel.
That crawlspace was the only way to retrieve shoes, hats, mobile phones, and anything else visitors lost over the edges of the safety rail. It was a good thing I found it, because the very next week I ended up slithering along the crawlspace several times. There is something about a rotating space (and we have had several) that makes people want to drop things into it.
After your wriggly journey down the tunnel to prod a long, curved stick at Nokias and Nikes, you would become ridiculously itchy. There was a lot of dust under that exhibit, and doubtless a lot of dust mites. All of which was rubbed deeply into the front of your uniform during your travels beneath the perception tunnel.
And every time a visitor came to us looking to retrieve their lost items, I was always first to volunteer.
I got to go somewhere few people could go. That was worth the dust and the itching.
One of my first secret places...
Along a certain part of the Swan River are some limestone caves, some partially underwater.
You can get to them by swimming, or by boat, or by squeezing between a gap in the fences around some of the bush to the south, as I used to.
The caves were one of my favourite secret places as a child. Sometimes you would see evidence of others visiting the area, but I never saw another soul. I walked along the rocks, snorkelled between rocky islands and into the cold water inside the caves, and enjoyed hearing nothing but the water lapping against the cliff face, and voices carried over the river from distant boats.
I want to see a lot more secret places before my life is done. I’m not sure where to look next. But I’m sure I’ll know them when I see them.