Hed: The most awkward place on earth

Sub: Why must elevators be so terrible?

Imagine a tiny room with one — occasionally two — sliding doors. There is lighting ­— always artificial — seldom accompanied by any natural light and never any furniture. Sometimes, there may be decorations, but they, like any music that may be playing, will be tasteless and wretched. There will always be buttons, and these will light up when pressed; a relationship is to be found between the frequency of the door’s opening and the number of pressed buttons.

Entry into this unpleasant little room is facilitated by the pressing of another set of buttons on the wall beside the room’s sliding doors. Why anyone would want to enter these horrid little rooms is beyond me.

They are called elevators, and they are both physically dangerous and the setting for society’s most painful and stifling awkwardness.

Think of the social taboos of an elevator and the unspoken rules associated with them: Stand facing the door. Don’t make eye contact. Don’t talk, except to request the pressing of a button. Be awkward. Feel squished.

My little brother, Nicholas, and I recently rode an elevator with our mother — our co-riders included a horde of people representing all walks of life. A demented noise — which I expect was a clearing of the throat from a particularly caricature-like individual ­— plunged my brother and me into silent agonies of hysteria.

It isn’t that we’re cruel people who enjoy laughing at involuntary coughing fits — rather, we deal with awkwardness and discomfort by laughing. No place better deserves these compulsive spasms of mirth better than elevators, and, as a result, Nicholas and I are nearly unable to participate in elevation.

Even when none of the elevator participants commit the faux pas of coughing, or a breach of any of my previously outlined elevator regulations, these little rooms are palpable with their discomfort. I think it may be accurate to say that any time Nicholas and I have been in an elevator together, we have nearly expired with the anguish of awkwardness.

What makes an elevator ride such a painful experience? It is the harsh and illogical firmness of society’s conformity to these painful regulations.

The agonies I face whenever transitioning from one floor to another by means of a device that could give out and plunge me to a smashing death at the bottom of a dark shaft could be alleviated if people ceased the present elevator etiquette.

Here is what should go down when going up — or down, I suppose: Face any wall but the one with the door. Make as much eye contact as possible with your fellow floor-climbers. Converse with them. Sing a little bit. Get everyone to jump just as the elevator is about to stop. Give out cupcakes and soda, or chips and guacamole.

Perhaps these suggestions are a bit extreme — who has the practicality to carry enough chips and avocado dip to feed up to 10 people?

What we should do, though, is allow fun and joviality to infect the territory of a frigid and forced ignorance of those around us. Instead of staring at the sliding door — eyes wide with the fear that you might draw attention to yourself or have someone initiate human interaction with you ­— engage with someone yourself.

Smile, compliment a cute bag or baby and maybe stand a few degrees off parallel with the door. Find a way to melt the tension. Either that, or Nicholas and I may just burst into fits­ once we reach our desired floor — and perhaps, even before the doors close.

Reach columnist Matt Jackson at opinion@dailyuw.com.