When I go to New York, I'll know not to spend my entire visit in an elevator.
Author: Frannyglass
(Very rough draft. Just some notes so that I won't forget this crazy thing. I'll write up the full explanation later.)
Was in New York City with family. Was doing some sort of acting skit with semi-famous directors who wouldn't give me enough guidance. Finally gave up on trying to teach me to act because they said they couldn't teach me "to act up here" (pointing to forehead. Huh?). Ex-friend Colette was there too, and she was selected to perform her skit in front of everyone because it was more conventional or something. Were in the lobby of the Empire State Building, by the way. The whole dream took place in the Empire State Building. People started painting a set for Colette, and she was complaining that it wasn't how she wanted it to look. Her parents, boyfriend, friends were there. I left, went to elevator, ran into some kid who was supposed to be in Colette's skit. Got out of elevator after only going up one floor. Went back down to lobby. Starting jumping on inflatable couch. Drama teacher/director told me to stop. I finally realized I didn't have to stay in the lobby the whole time. I could explore the building. So I did.
At first, I wandered around the lobby. All elevators (maybe six of them?) were in the middle. Tables and such encircled the elevators. Businesspeople eating lunch at tables. I started thinking, "All these people can answer in the affirmative if anyone ever asks them if they've been to New York." I thought about all the people who had never been to New York, and I felt pretty lucky.
Going up and down on the elevators for a while, just testing out my newfound freedom. I was almost always the only one in the elevator, and on the upper floors. It was as though I had discovered a big secret. One exception: Asian tourist guy in the elevator with me, when the elevator turned into a bathroom. He asked me if I had any soap. I produced a bottle of Herbal Essences shampoo. He put some on his hands and washed them in the sink in the elevator. He put the rest in his hair, slicking it back. He kept asking me how to get to the observation deck. I said that all the tourists were on the other side of the elevator. As we were going up, there was a small window in the elevator door. It mostly showed a metal grating and little else but darkness; I somehow knew that the "tourist elevator" was on the other side of that elevator. The tourist elevator was apparently on the outside of the building and took people straight up to the observation deck on the eighty-ninth (?) floor.
Then I was alone again. I went to different floors, just to see what was on them. Hotels, offices. The twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth floors were both parking garages. I didn't stop to think how and why people had put their cars on the twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth floors of the Empire State Building.
Fifty-seventh floor. Full of toys, just as I got off the elevator. Girl named Heidi who I kept playing with. She told me she lived on the floor. She led me down a hall and I saw all these bedrooms. Families lived on the floor. And they all shared one bathroom. Until we went a little farther and saw that the fifty-seventh floor had been built to look like a neighborhood. There were roads and trees and grass and big houses with long driveways. Sometime in the dream, I brought my dad and sister up to the 57th floor with me, and we all rode around in a Jeep, looking at this "natural world" that lived in the middle of the Empire State Building. Heidi rode with us. She was about eight. When we brought her back to the play area, though, her mother scolded her for hanging around with me.
Never understood how the 57th floor could have its own sky and atmosphere. How high were the ceilings on that floor anyway?
I kept wanting to go up higher, but I was afraid of my ears popping as the elevator rose, so I didn't go any higher. I figured I didn't need to hang out with the tourists on the observation deck, anyway.
Finally, other people in the elevator with me: nudist fraternity. Members were throwing half-cooked pieces of chicken on the floor of the elevator. Other people commenting on their weirdness.
Going back to the lobby with my sister, who had apparently been with me during the nudist fraternity ride. Met my dad, and then my mom, who said she had been looking all over for us. She had finally given up and spent her day in the movie theater, watching a double-feature of art films.
I'm sure there's more, but I'm going to have to rack my brain for it. This will be revised later.
