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sunshine jen: Elevator Writing
I park on P4, the lowest parking level of my office building. I actually like parking so far underground because I can usually score a spot close to the elevator lobby.
On Wednesday morning, I was two steps away from the elevator lobby when the elevator doors closed on a fellow P4 parker. I mentally called the parker an asshole for not holding the doors all of ten extra seconds for me to get on.
Less than a minute later, the same elevator doors opened and four people poured out of the elevator. They were the Asshole (with a receding hairline), the Dingbat, the Starched Shirt, and Ruggedly Handsome Guy. Apparently, the elevator was not leaving P4.
Oh great, it was a Jean Paul Sartre play, and I hadn’t taken my existentialist vitamin. The dysfunctional group informed me that they had been in an elevator to nowhere. Oh great, it was worse than a Jean Paul Sartre play. It was a writing 101 exercise.
Back in writing school, the craft 101 instructors liked to throw the elevator exercise at us. Basically, we had to put two characters who did not get along into an elevator. The elevator gets stuck and we’d get to write all sorts of dramatic sparks. I don’t know if they still do the elevator exercise in writing schools---especially after the video reality ofthe guy stuck in the elevator forty-one hours.
Fortunately, I was not in the bad elevator. I was in the elevator lobby with the new millennium cast of It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World.
As soon as the bad elevator doors closed, Dingbat, a blonde in office clothes, pressed the up button which naturally summoned the bad elevator back to us. Starched Shirt stepped into the elevator, informed us that all the buttons for the floors were lit up, and jumped off before the doors closed.
Don’t press the up button for a minute. I told the Dingbat who did as she was told. I should be nicer to blondes since I am one myself, but this girl was just itching to press the button. And she did press it about a minute later which brought back the bad elevator as another suit and another office blonde came into the lobby.
At this point, the Asshole complained about the constant work being done on the elevators, and Starched Shirt talked about taking the stairs, and Dingbat said there weren’t any stairs.
Realizing that I was standing in front of the emergency exit map, I turned and studied it. Of course, there were stairs. I saw the valet guys run up and down them all the time. Besides, I was sick of these people. They were annoying me.
Yep, there are stairs. I said and walked out of the elevator lobby with Ruggedly Handsome Guy right behind me. I spotted the staircase on the far side of the parking garage and bolted up the metal stairway. I was glad I had worn flats that day. I was glad to be away from the elevator lobby drama.
On P1, I told my parking attendant buddy that one of the elevators was stuck on P4. I pressed the up button and waited for an elevator. One eventually came and it was full with (of course) the writing 101 characters.
Oh no, not you people again! I said as I got on the elevator. A few of them chuckled, and one guy who hadn’t been stuck on P4 asked if he should be worried.
They have bad elevator karma. I said.
Asshole asked if I had reported the bad elevator.
Oh no, we have to keep it a secret between us. I said slightly sarcastically to more laughs. Gosh, an elevator audience is easy.
When I got to the office, I called my buddy in the office management office.
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