Going up, going down!?

The elevator…..I love the elevator!  I have always called it one of the best inventions ever!  Yes, I am guilty of using it when I should have rather used the staircase.  When I park on the roof of my local supermarket I use my shopping cart as the excuse to get into it.  Thanks to the elevator I have been on top of buildings that have taken my breath away.  Tokyo, Chicago, New York and Paris are only a few whose outlook have bewildered me thanks to a box that goes up and down.  Not that I not for a split second before the doors close what could happen if suddenly a power cut happens and I get stuck.  Stallie is not always not he road will a fully charged iPhone but at the other hand there will always be something edible to be found inside her purse!

Now it is not because that elevator saves out time and energy that I love it more than my car.  No, there is something extraordinary about that confined space with revolving doors.   It is within that the ‘magic’ or in some cases the ‘trauma’ comes to live.  How many times have you been in an elevator by yourself and did your brain went blank and were you able to push out the tiring and brain twisting thoughts?

And I am sure that you know that hotel elevators turn out to be the most awkward and silent spot of your lodgings.  The strangers you end up meeting up can make you feel so out of place and most of the time you just hope to get out as soon a possible in order to make a run for the breakfast buffet. There is also the hospital elevator that will take your the life defining doctor’s appointments and you might even have whispered into one of those so typical mirrors ‘Don’ worry…all be well…all is going to be okay….just calm down.’  The moment the doors open up you snap out of it and go on with the real life. Or those times that you went down two to get back to your car in an underground parking after midnight and just hope that your car is still okay and that you will not run into strange behaving individual?  I am sure that most of you had similar experiences. 

But there is more to an elevator and people who made me aware of that are movie&tv series directors.  No it is not always the underground or the kitchen where the action takes or the most in depth conversations take place.  It is that iron cubicle people end stand up in each other ’s chiacras and always are skin to skin.  Where you might rub a shoulder of a stranger or touch a hand you are desperate to touch but she or he seems to be immune for the your smiles.  It is in there that many times the most intense moments take place.  In more than movie or series it is the lift that is used as the driving force behind some of the most memorable moments on the screen. 

For those who wonder what I mean here a few examples of ‘outstanding’ and in some cases even ‘marvelous’ lift moments:
-Tom Cruise and Kelly McGellis in ‘Top Gun’.  It is in there that they seem to come to terms with their feelings for each other.  The moment that he leans over to push the button and says:’I am glad we got that straight’ and uses that iconic Tome Cruise smile and pumps a bit more his biceps can still make me laugh out loud. 
-The numerous elevator conversations in Mad Men. It is in those short conversations that we find out what is going on behind the scenes. More than once I have changed my opinion about a character after a ride in elevator.  Oh yes, directors will admit that is a very good way to save out some money but elevators in Mad Men are crucial to the story line and are in a sense the most deep going part of the whole series. It are 59 times we get the spend with them inside an confined place and loved every second of these journeys.  Not that they always made things cleared but it is made my obsession with lifts even more intense. https://youtu.be/wSvnap7wvFc
-The elevator in Charlie and the Chocolate factory and that also is one of the most exciting ones I met up on paper.  That one and the one in Abeltje. Annie MG Schmidt and Ronald Dahl already knew the impact of an elevator ride and the power it withholds.  Every time the button was pushed it was like my emotions got an extra jumpstart!  Pure magic!
-And then those moments that Doctor Grey and Doctor 'McDreamy' are inside that littel space are also more memorable than when they scrubed in togethert.  In Grey’s anatomy it is surely that there these two characters go full on and that they open up.  That he proposes to her in there is perhaps the only ‘perfect’ place to do so. It is where for once have the sensation that they wish to be all by themselves. ‘When there is an crisis, you don’t freeze…you move forward. You get the rest of us to move forwards because you have seen worse.’, it are such strong lines inside of confined place and actually it only makes it sound so much powerful. Romance at it’s highest impact.  I just wonder how long it took the crew to put that elevator together! 
-That specific elevator ride that Christian Grey forgets about all the paperwork he is so strict about.  It is like as if the moment that the doors close he just looses all the control that he is so notorious and boast about.  He just lets all his fences down during that particular ride down.  'What is it about elevators?'-line is so cheesy and cliché but it does make so clear that the control freak surely has some spots that are beyond his control.  Don't start now that you are not aware of your own weaknesses or dark side, please don't. Your defense is futile when it is going down or up.
-There is the memorable elevator scene in ‘Serendipity’ that when I saw it for the very first time made me just yell at the screen.  That moment that they both push the same number we all know that this is too good to be true and that it does not work like that but against all odds you just hope.  Destiny and faith they are a bit more complicated in a Hollywood script but that the scriptwriter  decided to send in a child dressed up as the devil did make it stand out in the land of elevator rides.
https://youtu.be/ctAymN-ff6c
-Captain America who is in a big trouble the moment he notices that they have send in the troops while he going down and then says:’Before we get started does anyone want to get out?’  Politeness becomes an Avenger even when he ends up being ambushed in an elevator!  Loving that scene because trust is something very hard to come by in an elevator as it seems.
-The elevator rides Ryan Gosling takes with Carey Mulligan and during one suddenly goes in total overdrive. Personal for me one of the most iconic scenes every because the body language and power demonstrated gave me goosebumps. That moment you feel the tension rise and see that he already has seen it coming miles ahead before you.  It is then then Ryan Gosling his character becomes so much more than a driver with a dark side. Yes, that is a very violent one and it made me even fill up with disgust but still one of the best elevator scenes ever that just makes you wonder how much of life is decided inside of an elevator.

Now you might think that these are all pure fiction and that none of these things are likely to happen in real time.  Hmm…well honestly they do and I even know someone who proposed in an elevator.  Meaningful things, even life changing things happen in an elevator.  And one of my friends had a rather dull talk about the weather in an hotel elevator in Geneva and when he got out it was an friend who saw them both getting out and stood there with his mouth hopen. It was then that he found he had the pleasure to have been coming down in the company of James Bond allias Roger Moore!

Nope, it is not all fiction what takes place inside an elevator. Ask that also Senator Flake who last Friday ended up facing two very fierce ladies who got to talk to him right there in that particular spot. Maria Gallagher and Ana Maria Archill confrontated an American politician and expressed their opinion about what there is about to happen to women their body and mind.  There are tons of people out there who have a very outspoken opinion about the way the ‘opponent’ is dealing with the nominee for the Supreme Court of the United States. Personal I don’t think that many of us outside the US fully comprehend the impact of the supreme court on the daily lives of American citizens and at a certain level how it can influence our own moral compass and regulations.  It is ‘thanks’ to this power that even after Trump leaves the White House that his legacy lives on and will have an impact on millions of people.  These 9 people have got the power to overturn decisions they made before and that might not seem that big of a deal but believe me it is!  

So that two above mentioned women kind of ambushed a leading politician who was inside of an elevator was something that in itself surely stands out.  Senator Flake did Friday something that made many people wonder why he did what he did.  Not that he answered the questions that these fierce ladies spit at him.  Personal I think it also not were the questions only that matter in this case. It is rather what these women told him right into his face.  He has uphold power and he has got power…he is about to vote on a person who has got the ultimate power over society.  Flake going up and down the elevator is perhaps to best metaphor for what many politicians but also many of us must  experience when they are in limbo or are in doubt.  We will never know what Flake was going through once the door closed.  I am okay with that but it must have been a different than routine ride going down to the parking lot of the Senate building.

The thing is that when I get into an elevator I almost feel liberated and that some of the missing puzzle pieces seem to snap into place.  It is like the most neutral place where I seem to be still granted some private time to get my head around things. It is there that collision take place, that fireworks go off, that I dare to look straight into the mirror, that my face tells me what I might have been trying to hide, that my brain comes to a total standstill.  Going up or going down in an elevator has taken me to so many places and some of the insignificant rides have surely made the difference.  

Yes, I admit it that the Stallie who got into the elevator might not be the same one when once the doors open up again and I am forced to get out and snap back in the 'normal' routine.   You might never notice the difference but then I consider the elevator a kind of mental no man’s land…in case you ever get the pleasure of joining me on one of these unpredictable voyages then be aware you might be in for a ride of a life time!  I bet you know exactly what I mean…I bet you already some elevator experiences yourself.  Cherish them and make them count. It might be the only place where it all makes sense…where we come to terms with what we are given and what it taken away from us.

P.S: I am fully aware that British English is 'lift' but I did stick to 'elevator' for this entry.  Just for once and for the sake of the picture I selected to go along with this entry.