Love in An Elevator

I'm not really a fan of elevators.

But today I found myself in one that I almost never take.

My regular routine for arriving at the college where I teach was interrupted today since I needed to make a detour and stop at campus police for a key.

This lead me to walk across campus from my assigned parking garage instead of taking the parking garage elevator (which for some reason doesn't bother me) straight up to the top and just walking over to my building from there.

And then?  Once the key was in my hand, I walked over to the first floor of my building and had to take that elevator up to to the top floor.

I walked up to the elevator just as it was letting a couple people out and I quick squeezed in, and reached over and hit "5".

Suddenly?  It was 1997 and I was in my dorm elevator.

All four of us in that elevator were trying to stand as far away from each other as humanly possible without looking like we were trying to stand as far away from each other as humanly possible.

Of course the elevator went down to the basement before going up.  And the dude in the back with the HUGE pile of stuff got off. 

Just like in college when someone with 4 weeks worth of laundry got off at the basement and you were pretty sure that person?  Was down there for the duration.

Then we went back up to the ground level.  And stopped.  And the door opened.  And no one was there.

Just like in good old Harrison Hall.  I swear it was the LAW that that damn elevator ALWAYS stop on the ground floor, JUST to waste everyone's time.

We proceeded up. 

I stood straight back from the doors so that I could see the other two passengers out of my peripheral vision while staring up at the numbers.

The elevator was as old as the building which was as old as dirt.

There were weird straining noises.

There was a shimmy.

I was 19 again, coming back from class after an afternoon of boring classes hoping beyond hope that this old ass elevator just made it to the top floor so I could take a nap.

The elevator stopped on the third floor.

The older lady on my left exited and I swiftly moved into her corner.  I leaned back and slouched into the shape of the corner.

I was coming back from a late night hoping that the elevator ride wouldn't be too long...or have too much moving.  I just needed to make it back to my room.  Why was the elevator spinning?  Please don't let me puke here in front of other people.

We stopped  on the fourth floor and suddenly I was alone in the ancient elevator.

Alone with the smell of dirtied floor wax and old sweat and the inside of someones nasty backpack.

I am kicking a discarded Popov bottle with one toe, and trying to avoid the sticky substance on the floor in the corner.  I've also noticed that someone has stuck his/her gum on the hand rail.  Again.  And do I smell old pizza?

I come out of my zone and realize I am on the fifth floor.  My floor.  As I straighten up to exit, I adjust my tote bag and take a step forward.  Out of something sticky.

And do I smell old pizza?

Huh.

The Day That Exploded

This week everyone is remembering.  Because we are not supposed to forget.

So I will remember....

I was teaching middle school Spanish.

The assistant principal came to the door to say a plane had crashed in the World Trade Center and not to turn on the TV.

I didn't know what the World Trade Center was.

I was fresh out of college.  Very young.  Very naive.

At lunch I realized what was going on, but needed people to explain to me what all the politics were.  I never heard of the World Trade Center, or the terrorists groups, or anything.

After work I needed gas because I had coasted into the parking lot that morning on fumes.  Due to the uncertainty of what was going to happen with the middle east?  The lines at the pumps were unbelievable.

I almost ran out of gas waiting.  And I paid about a million dollars.

I went to my boyfriend's house.  He had slept through the whole damn day.  He worked third shift, but it seemed unreal.  I turned the TV on for him and he almost shat himself.

I went home to my parents' house.  My mom wouldn't stop watching the news.  She said she thought this was what had been foretold in Revelation.

I told her to get a grip.  Just because bad stuff was happening to Americans didn't mean the world was ending.  I told her to remember the Holocaust and the atomic bombs and other countries who had more people die.  And the end of the world didn't happen.

I was angry.

I was angry that these terrorists made America start talking about Armageddon like we were the only country that mattered.

I was angry that moms and dads and uncles and aunts and brothers and sisters went to work like it was no big deal and weren't going to come home.

I was angry at the patriotism, but also found comfort in it.

I was angry that people forgot for a minute that it was my little brother's 16th birthday FIRST.  It was HIS DAY before it was the terrorist's day.

I was angry that people kept saying, "if this then the terrorists win," "if that then the terrorists win,".

I was angry that for awhile?  EVERYTHING was blamed on terrorism and American reverted to the old witch hunt mentality again.  If you're not with us, you must be against us.

When will we learn our lesson?

When will we realize that these egocentric attitudes and easily divisiveness is exactly why others hate us.

When will we really be able to remember that love that everyone talks about?

Love means not hating.

I don't think Americans can quit their habit of hating.  They want to.  They do.  They keep talking about needing to spread the love, but in the name of love?  They hate.

And this is something I will remember.  That spreading hate?  Will make a day explode again.

Everyone Has a Momma

It was a Wednesday night at the very beginning of January, 2001.

Christmas break was over.  Thursday school started up again, and I was home from college to live for free while I did my student teaching.

I don't remember much of the day other than what was going on right in that moment.  I had just helped my mom finish up the dinner dishes.  Both of my brothers were in the basement watching TV or playing video games.

Mom and I were going to go get groceries and the boys were going to go to youth group later.  While my mom fluttered around trying to put things away, the phone rang.

My parents didn't (and still don't) have caller id.

Mom was getting ready to get groceries.  The house was dark because in the winter it gets dark around 5:00pm.  The only light came from the light over the sink and the glow of the stair light oozing up the basement stairs.  Even my brothers were sitting in just the glow of the TV downstairs.

I was the closest to the phone, so I answered it.

The woman on the phone identified herself as being from the nursing home where my grandma lived.  She asked to talk to my mom.  Something in my stomach turned over.

I told my mom that the phone was for her.

She stood near the counter where our phone hung. I sat uncomfortable on the kitchen table wringing my hands.

My grandma had been suffering from Alzheimer's for some time.  At this point she was in the final stages.  She was in a total care nursing home.  She didn't know who she was, who we were, that she even WAS.  She couldn't eat on her own...her body forgot how to do that long ago.  So she was in a bed. My aunt and cousin would go and take her for walks and paint her nails and do her hair.  But she wasn't my grandma anymore.

My grandma loved life and was out of control awesome.

this person didn't know she was alive. and because of this?  We had accepted the inevitable long before.

anyway, that phone call was to tell my mom--the power of attorney for my grandma--that she had passed away in her sleep.  My mom calmly took the information.

When she got off the phone she was stunned.  I asked her if she wanted me to call my dad at his archery club and have him come home.  She said no.  I asked her if I could help.  She started saying how she had to call all three of her sisters and make arrangements and tell my Grandma's brothers and sisters. 

I told her she didn't have to do it NOW.  She could take a minute. 

And in the weirdest moment of my life up until then, she looked at me and nodded.  We momentarily switched roles.

She went off to the bathroom.

I called my dad at his archery club anyway.  He said he would come home.

I went downstairs and sat down in the dark and told my brothers to please turn down the volume.  Then I told them that Grandma had died.  They were both sort of quiet and stunned.

None of us had experienced death before.

My middle brother asked me what we were supposed to do.

I didn't know.

I asked them if they were sad.

They said they supposed they were, yes.

I asked them if they wanted to stay home from youth group.

Neither did.  I understood that.  It's easier to go and do your life and avoid thinking about it. 

Then I went upstairs to tell my mom I had told the immediate family.

I found her in the bathroom, with the light off, sitting on the closed toilet softly crying for her momma.

And that is when I realized....

Grandma?  Was not just Grandma.

She was a mommy.  She was my MOMMY'S mommy.

Lots of people lose their grandparents.  Old people die.  That was a fact of life I knew.

But mom's don't die.  My mind couldn't understand what it was understanding. A mommy had just died.

Suddenly visions of my mom as a baby and a little girl and a teenager and a bride and a new mom flooded my brain.  Her mom was always there.  Just like my mom was always there.

And even though Grandma had been sick, she was there.

But now she wasn't. 

And I hugged my mom.

In my family?  We don't hug.  We don't say I love you.

We just love.

I hugged my mom in that dark bathroom. I told her I loved her.

And I have feared death irrationally ever since.