There goes my hand modeling career

I park on the 8th floor of a parking garage. I’m still half asleep and running late when I get to work so I take the elevator to the ground level instead of taking the stairs. There are two elevators and it’s a good bet that one of them will be out of order. If you’re lucky enough to be on one that’s functioning, all it takes is a glance at the Certificate of Inspection dated 2003 to realize that you might get stuck at any time and be left to bake inside this modern day glass sauna.

As I stepped in this morning, I exchanged pleasantries with another woman as the door closed to begin our descent. There must have been something wrong with the cabling because it went at a snails pace and made a loud clang at each floor.


“I hate these elevators.”, I said.

CLANG!

“I know. They’re the worst. I don’t think they even inspect them.”

CLANG!

“I usually don’t mind walking down in the morning but I'm late, as usual.”

CLANG!

“Have you ever been in one when it drops?”

CLANG!

“Drops?!”

CLANG!

“Yep. I was riding down one morning when it just dropped for about 5 floors and then it stopped.”

CLANG!

“And you’re still riding it?”

CLANG!

She shrugged her shoulders as the doors open and she walked out. I turned to look back at the elevator as it climbed to the top of the garage.

I had my own scary elevator experience in 2006. I was working in downtown Cleveland at a landmark building built in the early 1920’s. You might even recognize it from the parade scene in the 1983 movie, A Christmas Story.



A co-worker and I had gone to pick up a cake for the President of the organization because he had won some award or another. I was carrying the sheet cake and thought how lucky I was that an elevator was just sitting there with its doors open. As I started to walk in, the doors began to close. Normally, a properly functioning elevator will have a sensor that opens the doors back up when it detects something in its path. This was not a properly functioning elevator.

The doors continued to close and I saw the cake box begin to buckle. I was like a mama bear trying to save its cub as I held onto that cake for dear life and pushed back against the doors with my hands. Hey, it was buttercream frosting. You would have done the same.

The doors finally opened and I looked down at my left hand which was sliced and bleeding. The nerve sensors finally reached my brain and I started to cry from the pain. Now, mind you, I have a very high tolerance for pain. In fact, there are times when I actually like it. This was not one of those times. The pain was awful but the trooper (idiot) that I am, I proceeded on to the party and put some ice on my hand.

In retrospect, I should have dropped the cake and fell to the floor, writhing in pain because the fat bastard who the cake was celebrating "downsized my position" just one month later.

I tried to take some legal action against the building after this comment was made by a building worker, We have lots of these accidents. So they knew there was a problem but they were negligent. Apparently, having a scar on your hand is not grounds for any cash but next time, I'll be sure to lose an appendage to help my case.