This is a story from last fall when I was working down in Los Angeles at SpotRunner.
A little background before I start my story:
My office is on the top floor of a twenty-two storey building. To get
there, I ride the 15-22 express elevators. Our express elevators blast
off from the first floor with discernible G force up to the 14th floor
then slow down for the milk run through the upper floors.
A little more background before I start my story:
My floor is a "secure" floor. The Turkish Consulate (!) is on the 17th
floor and is a secure floor, too. The elevator will not stop on those
floors unless you have a special keychain fob that you wave in front of
a special panel inside the elevator. You get in the elevator along
with everyone else and people press buttons for their floors, "18",
"15", what have you. But a person going to a "secure" floor must
wave their key fob at the special panel, then push 22 (or 17 if they are
going to the Turkish Consulate).
This extra security thing is not really much of a security barrier for
terrorists or other ne'er-do-wells to infiltrate but it *is* a very
ostentatious sign of office-grade class distinction. For instance, if
the lobby is crowded, the first person who gets on the elevator first
often stations himself next to the buttons and helpfully asks other
fellow travelers "what floor?" and presses the buttons for them. Not
really necessary, of course, but such small courtesies are part of
what makes the world go around (and the elevator go up). But the
person going to a special floor must (with a mock-rueful shrug and
half-smile) decline the "what floor?" offer, and say "I have to wave
this to get to my floor, sorry." They must reach past everyone and
wave the key fob and press the button themselves. Everyone in the
carriage watches this wordlessly, but the camaraderie of the upcoming
voyage upward is definitely broken -- someone from "First Class" is in
steerage. Icy silence reigns as the elevator leaps upward. The snob
is jubilant.
And another wee point about this particular bank of elevators:
There is some sort of irksome timing issue with our key fob security
system. There is a little light on the panel that is always glowing
orange. When the key fob wave is successful, the light goes red.
Then you can press the 22 button, the 22 button will light and the
elevator will eventually stop on the 22nd floor. The fob system seems to like to
wait a second or two before granting access, so you wind up jabbing away
at the 22 button until it lights. Sometimes, the little light goes
from red back to orange without the 22 button lighting and you have to
start the key fob waving over again. These antics are always conducted
in grim, frosty silence. The other passengers have already dubbed you an
elevator elitist (the worst kind) and no one will provide helpful suggestions or offer
encouragement. The helpful "what floor?" button-pressing man has moved as far
away from you and your key fob as possible, preferring to stand with
his disenfranchised, fob-less brothers and sisters.
I have mixed feelings about the whole thing. I like being special and
having to press my special key fob to go to my special top-floor
super-spy-hideout complete with Inter-Galactic Council Chambers. But it is embarrassing
at the same time to have a showy, geeky, malfunctioning, self-important
procedure I make everyone else suffer. But that's life in the big
city.
One more point in general about elevators:
If the lobby is quiet, there will generally be an elevator carriage
sitting with its door open awaiting riders. If you walk into the
elevator and don't press any buttons, the elevator will still sit
there. Of course. It doesn't know where you want to go yet. Press a
button and off it goes. Or... wave your key fob frantically and jab
away at 22 (or 17 for the Turkish Consulate) and off it goes.
So, on with my story.
One fine evening, I and a colleague walked into our building after
stepping out to get some take-out food. The lobby was quiet and dark,
and there was an elevator carriage waiting for us. We stepped into the
carriage and got started on the procedure of trying to get approval to
travel to the 22nd floor. We both had our key chains out and ready,
and since there was no one else in the carriage, we could be quite
openly jolly about being First Class elevator travelers together -- no
coach passengers to feel slighted. In short, we co-operated on the
whole waving the key fob and pressing the buttons procedure. I am a new
employee and therefore it is appropriate for me to be slightly
obsequious. Therefore I was first and vigorous with the key fob wave
while my senior colleague manned the 22 button. No joy on 22 -- the
button wouldn't light. So, with a mock-exasperated sigh, the "veteran"
did the key fob wave while I meekly worked the 22 button. The elevator
doors closed and off we went. However, the 22 button still wouldn't
light. I pounded relentlessly and enthusiastically on the button.
So many things are difficult at a job when you are new, and that day
like most days was fully of "new guy" humiliations big and small --
so this evening, at this moment, I told myself I was not going suffer
defeat to an elevator button simply for lack of effort! Thus goaded,
I redoubled my efforts. Stab stab stab stabitty stab stab stab...
My colleague faltered, his fob-waving slowed, then stopped. I stabbed and stabbed.
He turned to me and said "Dude..." I jabbed away, heedless. stab stab stab "Dude! Dude!"
He put his hand on my arm to stop me "Dude, stop pressing the button.
Stop! Look. There are no buttons lit. And there's no one upstairs... "
I stopped. We stood there and looked at the unlit buttons. We were closing in on the Turkish Consulate's floor with no sign of slowing, and the panel remained unlit.
He said slowly, "Dude? Where.. are.. we... going?"
The elevator carriage kept whooshing skyward, now faster than ever it seemed, so it was becoming
comically urgent to get our floor selected. Finally, laughing and screaming "augh!!!!", we both mashed our
key fobs against the panel to get the light to go red again and we
machine-gun pressed the 22 button. The Turkish Consulate was fading in our taillights and we were still
accelerating skyward
before the button finally lit up! Moments later the elevator calmly slowed
and stopped at 22, with a smooth calm, quiet finish. The doors efficiently whisked open and we peeked out at the dark, empty
lobby on the 22nd floor. No one had summoned the elevator to 22 or any
other floor -- the lobby was dark because the lights go out when no one is around.
We got out, the lights came on, and life seemed to return to normal. But we just stood and looked at each other, then looked back at the
elevator. The elevator doors stayed open, the carriage still. Clearly, the elevator had
nothing else pressing to do, no other urgent business requiring a headlong unasked-for rush to the basement, say. So where had the elevator been taking us at top speed? Good thing we managed to get it to stop at 22!! If we hadn't pressed any buttons, where would it have gone?
To the roof, the universe, and beyond? Or even further, say, to Santa Monica?
We still don't know what that was all about.
