Stuck in an Elevator

How I Survived My First Floor Scare

I flew back home from vacation on a Thursday. I worked on Friday, but from home and it took the entire day to catch up on a week’s worth of email.

Monday was my first day back in the office. I work on the 11th floor. I stepped into one of six elevators in my lobby and hit the 11th floor. The doors closed and the elevator didn’t move. I was the only one in there at the time. I hit the 11th floor again, nothing. I hit the 10th and 12th floor. Nothing. I hit the Door Open button. Guess what? Nothing. I hit it a few more times for good measure. Nope.

I decided to hit the ringing bell button. That made a really loud noise. Much louder than I expected. There was a guard sitting in the lobby and I knew she had to hear it. I kept hitting it until I finally heard her yelling at me through the door. I didn’t realize how much noise there was in the elevator shaft (I said, shaft) and the lobby until someone was trying to yell at me through the door. I could barely hear her, but she said she was getting help and asked if I needed medical assistance. No, just want to get out of the elevator.

Did I panic? No, because I was on the first floor. I had no fear of being dropped down many floors. I also wasn’t stuck in between floors and people knew I was stuck there. The worst case scenario for me would have been having to pee. Thankfully, I was good on that front.

While waiting for help, I sent an email to my boss that I was there, just hanging out in the elevator for a bit to start off the day. At least I had some internet access while stuck.

Another guard showed up and told me to try to push the doors together. They looked shut to me, but okay. I barely touched them and the elevator moved up and opened up on the 11th floor like nothing happened. I guess the door wasn’t closed all the way at the very top of it, so as a precaution, it wouldn’t let the elevator move until the doors were closed all the way. It thought I was stuck in between floors. No, elevator, I was just sitting on the first floor for about 10 minutes.

I arrived at my desk and my boss laughed and said, “I see you really didn’t want to start working again after your vacation.” Happy Monday!