I would like to first open up to you about my elevator preferences. I like to ride in Otis elevators, Miami elevators, ThyssenKrupp elevators, and Westinghouse elevators. Once elevators lose these name brands, it gets harrier. Its like name brand cereal. You can either trust Life cereal or Live it Up! cereal. You can either trust Miami or Reliable Elevator Co. Yes, the company is called Reliable Elevator Company. I don't want an elevator company trying to convince me they're reliable. I want to know if they're reliable or not automatically.
1. Name brand recognition
The doors open. The lights flicker. The lights are on. You step inside. You push the button for floor 3. The doors close. Off. On. You see a colorful shoe. Off. Thump. You look behind you. Nothing. On. You have a knife to your neck. There are no Penn State students to attack the clown for you. Too bad you didn't have good lighting. With good lighting you would've pulled the bicycle tire iron out of your backpack and beaten the crap out of the clown... instead of dying.
2. Lighting
2. Lighting
"Ahhh! the smell of Newark," said no one ever. The Newark airport is pretty run down, to say the least. Birds flying through the terminal. Plastic bags covering door handles (I'm not really sure why). And really smelly elevators. It smelled of sweat mixed with moth balls mixed with alcohol (NOT GOOD!) Some may argue that a weird smell isn't ideal but it doesn't make an elevator creepy. But you don't know what created the smell.
3. Smell (and birds)
Anything with intricate gold designs or an iron wrought gate that closes before the doors makes me a little unnerved. It makes me think the elevator is old. No offense to old things, but as things get older they start to break down and not work as well. One thing you want to work well is an elevator. If it doesn't work it could drop you. And you would feel light, light, light until SLAMMMM! You're dead. Which brings me to right to my last criteria for creepy elevators.
4. Design
A jolting experience. That is not good. If you're riding an elevator you don't want it to stop suddenly when its time to get off. This is unpleasant at the very least and make you never want to ride that elevator again at the worst. When an elevator does that, I don't know if it will fall all the way down after the initial jerk.
5. Jolts
Yup. There they are.
Given all these things that make an elevator ride unpleasant, you would think I'd be happy with a good elevator ride. But, I have a real elevator phobia about them dropping like the Tower of Terror and unlike the Tower of Terror to my death. Pretty dark stuff you're thinking or "ok we get it you're afraid of elevators, don't be a baby." However, having a transparent elevator in my home to get me to my bedroom, I've begun to trust elevators a little bit more. Hopefully, I'll be able to get completely over my fear by riding the scariest, nastiest, dankest (in a bad way), can't get any worse elevator on campus.
... To Be Continued
I never thought a blog post on elevators could be interesting. But your style, tone, and content is not only humorous but insightful. Great post and i'll be back for part 2!
ReplyDeleteI didn't know I was freaked out by elevators until I moved into Curtin Hall, where the doors open while you're still in the elevator shaft, a problem which gets worse every time I use them. They also jolt badly when they stop, and considering how old the building is...I've been taking the stairs recently, to say the least. Really great and relatable post!
ReplyDeleteThis was really funny! I loved your subtle humor you related to your experiences, which by the way, I would have never guessed that you have an elevator phobia. My only recommendation would be to number your subtitles before the upcoming paragraph. I will definitely read this again!
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