Simon Walker writes in That's Life: Finding closure and household peace by learning to close to cupboard doors

It's hard to compose an open and shut case as to why this is.

But on any given day, after I've been through, the kitchen at my place allegedly looks like the AFP has ransacked the joint.

And like the AFP, it's never really certain I've found what I'm looking for.

My partner reckons Google couldn't come up with a more reliable tracking device.

Of movements, often in the dark, illuminating snack attacks, dashes to the microwave, the odd rummage for pots and pans and general searching.

But I've got nothing to hide about what I seek. And that seems to be the problem.

That, and closing the cupboards after I open them.

More from Simon Walker: The complete That's Life archive

David Attenborough would have a field day on the narration:

"Unable to find the peeler in the cutlery drawer, the male moves to the cupboard and peers pensively for the peanut butter before another fruitless plunge into the plastic container drawer seeking a lid that fits. Discouraged he heads to the fridge, never once thinking, as the door alarm peels, to restore that which he has disturbed. Usually his partner."

There is regular payback when I hit a leg on one of those open cupboard doors. Or stub the knee on the dishwasher. Or rise like Lazarus from the pantry to smash my head on the open microwave door.

And sometimes, something dawns, Space Odyssey style - maybe this could be avoided ... then a distraction, and so it goes.

Guilty as charged, I'd say, if not of a crime against humanity then certainly one that generates passion, and if only it was as simple as 'case closed'. Or rather cupboard.

But the world is full of cliches and applying them to domestic matters is where the fat traditionally hits the fire.

We're encouraged to burn bright but not burn out, and yet you get the impression that if those doors remain ajar, something might extinguish. A relationship perhaps, like tears in the rain, washed down the plughole.

Windows of opportunity open like kitchen drawers. And while we're encouraged to take the plunge, few would suggest leaping without a look because landing has always been the tricky part of flying.

Yet to not aim high would be to lower expectations and in that way perhaps avoid disappointment, although the cupboard doors are still open and this would suggest otherwise.

It's easy to talk yourself in circles and sure enough many things come round.

But not necessarily your partner to those endless excuses about the bloody open kitchen drawers.

A receptacle for dreams, not just household items.

A place for everything, and everything one day surely back in its place.

It's not not done on purpose but so regularly it's just not not done.

This is a book that CAN be judged by it's cover and like my partner I'm seeking closure so we can live happily ever after.

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