Love in a Elevator

Greetings Readers

Nope. There was no love in the elevator, but I hope I got your attention.

This blog is about the elevator and another “incident” in a manner of speaking that happened within the last week to me. I was in a building that had four elevators.

The morning opens with me getting on one of the elevators and going up.

I am the only person in the elevator. While I was in the elevator I was digging in my backpack looking for something. What I was looking for is irrelevant to this story, but what is – is that I was busy looking for something. Meanwhile, I feel as well as hear the elevator come to a stop on a floor. A floor mind you that was not my stop. I hear the elevator ding on the lobby of whatever floor the elevator was stopping at. From the corner of my eye I can see a person standing right in from of the elevator that the elevator doors just opened from. Other than that I am still digging through my stuff in my backpack looking for what I need.

“Is this elevator going up?” I hear a man’s voice ask.

I do not know if he was talking to me nor did I care. I did not hear the courtesy “excuse me sir” or “pardon me sir,” or the “excuse me.” After all, if I were looking at him then I would visibly know that he was probably asking me the question. If had said, “excuse me”, then this whole incident would not be written on this particular post. However, he did not and well I have a story for you Readers

Getting back to the story… I was currently preoccupied with locating what I needed to find in my backpack at that moment. I could care less what else is going on around me. Though, I am not oblivious to my surroundings.

Readers – there may a right way or a polite thing to do and I do not disagree with you Readers.

I could have easily looked up and responded in my most polite way ever and say “yes.”

I could have looked up and said in that Robert DeNiro attitude in Taxi Driver and said “Are you talking to me?”

I could have looked up and said “No, this elevator is going to Cambodia” without so much as a smile.

I could have looked up and said, “Well, what does the elevator light indicate outside the elevator show?”

I could have look up and said, “No, this elevator is going sideways” without missing a beat or a smile.

I could have looked up and said, “why don’t you take off those sunglasses yourself and see which light indicator is pointing outside the elevator.

And the list goes on and on. I have blogged about this before and I probably will continue to do so in the future.

Anyway, in a manner of seconds, or before the elevator doors closed between us he was able to figure out the answer to his own question he asked that morning and got in the elevator with me.

Readers, I have many, many moods and they vary from time to time and day to day. One day I could be the kindest person in the world and yet the next day I could the prick of your nightmares. I don’t discriminate on who I am nice or mean to – it all depends on the moment.

Now, when I was looking in my bag I had no clue whether who the person in the corner of my eye was – meaning a male or female. I was pre-occupied and that was that. When that person spoke then I knew the gender immediately, however that did not stop from searching for what I was looking for.

Most of you probably will say I should have answered his question, since that is “right” thing to do.

I disagree. When that person spoke and became a man I quickly thought to myself that a man should not be asking another man for directions on which way the elevator is going – especially so since he is not asking for directions to the Federal Building in Downtown Denver or the Chatfield Corn Maze. Meaning, I would tell him Take I-25 for x miles until you get to street x, then turn right go x blocks… as you can see where I am going with this. That type of asking directions is complex and is okay for a man to ask another man for directions.

However, the directions he was asking for was so simple that a kindergarten student could figure out which way that particular elevator was going for him/herself. Either the elevator was going up or down. Period. Whenever, I hear a man ask a simple question such as that I wonder if his girlfriend or wife has him whipped to a point he is not able to function without her when not around her.

I had no obligation to answer his question, especially so when he did not say excuse me to interrupt my backpack searching that particular morning. I was not rude either since I was technically not being addressed personally; meaning if I was looking directly at him when he asked that question and did not answer his question then that would be rude. Matter of fact Readers, he was rude for not saying “excuse me” before asking a question that was most likely intended for me. Readers, I cannot assume that he was asking the question at me since I was not looking at him. Even though I was the only one in the elevator how do I not know that he was asking another person in the lobby that out of my view from inside the elevator?

I am not required to look at every person who asks a question when I am not looking at them. Readers, I am being general on this. Obviously, this does not pertain to my friends or at the place I work at – just general areas in public with total strangers.

Until the next time

Daryl Charley
The Fallen Athlete