Lingerie, 2nd Floor

There are many good reasons to wear your child in some kind of carrier or sling or sommat. Babywearing proponents say that babies who are carried all day will sleep better at night, cry less, start their own blogs and have their timestables memorized by the age of 2. Also, the wearers’ hands are free to type, eat, do tequila shots, whatever. With all of this in mind, I made a point of purchasing a Baby Bjorn before Trombone was born. I had pretty images of me walking through the neighbourhood, examining lawns with both hands while my adorable baby, strapped to my chest, cooed and burbled. How content we would be!

(Like a lot of things I pictured before the baby was born, it didn’t work out this way. Trombone likes the Bjorn enough as a distraction from other methods of transportation but a) the distraction doesn’t last long and b) the kid’s 18 lbs! How far am I supposed to get with 18 lbs strapped to my chest? UPHILL? Which is not to say that there might not be a better babywearing option available to me. Something that can do a hip carry, say, or a back carry. But I digress. And overuse parentheses.)

The best reason to wear your baby, though? You won’t have to take the elevator.

The problem with elevators is twofold: 1. the people who pee, smoke pot and rub their stinky armpits on the walls in every elevator everywhere (except Ikea). (Seriously – is there a team of people who go from place to place peeing in elevators? “Team Elepee!” Am I missing a fetish? Should I google and freak someone else out about their referrals?) And 2. the people who design where the elevators are in a given building.

One example: Our subway system, the Skytrain, terminates underground in downtown Vancouver, at a station called “Waterfront.” For the ablebodied there are two exits; east and west. The west exit has a flight of stairs and an escalator which take you to either a tunnel and then another flight of stairs or to a food court which contains a Flying Wedge Pizza. Mmmm. The east exit has a flight of stairs, an escalator and an elevator.

To get to the Flying Wedge Pizza on foot, you exit west, walk up one flight of stairs, go through a set of doors then walk up 5 more stairs and then you are in the food court: enjoy your pizza!

To get to the Flying Wedge Pizza with a stroller, wheelchair or set of oversized Samsonite, you must take the east exit, walking down a long, lonely hallway, through a cold corridor, taking an elevator up one level, heading outside and walking four blocks west, then taking an elevator through a hotel lobby down one level and progressing down another very long hallway until you find yourself in the food court. Starving. Yes, both elevators smell like pee, pot and armpit.

Another example: Yesterday I was in Army & Navy, the Incredible Discount Department Store. You know why. Looking for rubber goddamn boots. Now, I love Army & Navy. Ask anyone. When I was a kid, my parents and I would go to the A&N on Hastings Street. We’d park at the Woodwards building (since re-hipstered into condos) and walk the block and a half to the store. I distinctly remember walking past Funky Winker Beans pub (where yes! I have had a $1 glass of Canadian) and my mom saying about some drunk/high guy, “It’s okay – he’s just a little under the weather.” (That’s my family’s euphemism for drunk or high and, in this case, a fantastic understatement.)

Army & Navy has perfectly useful clothing, kitchen items, camping gear and desperately cheap DVDs (this is the only reason Saint Aardvark ever goes with me – a 4-DVD set of Kung Fu movies for $9.99). Once a year, they have a shoe sale but I don’t particularly care for it because either there are no shoes my size or all the drag queens get there first thing in the morning. The sight of tiny women hauling around baskets of cute size 6 shoes is aggravating enough to make me fantasize about taking an axe to their toes – and there are axes at the Army & Navy, oh yes, so I just don’t go. Much.

Anyway, I was there yesterday, not the one on Hastings, though, the one on Columbia Street in New Westminster. Possibly the oldest Army & Navy in the world. It was here that I became very glad that I always carry the Bjorn with me in the bottom of the stroller.

First we strolled around the street-level floor looking for the elevator.

No, actually FIRST I found another rack of size 13 men’s rubber boots. Men, if you have size 13 feet, you have got it GOOD!

Then I strolled around the street-level floor looking for the elevator so I could go down a level to women’s shoes. I knew there was an elevator, because I had been at this store once before, down a level and had seen a couple come out of a doorway pushing a stroller.

There were signs hanging from the ceiling: “ESCALATOR” and “STAIRS” and “FIRE EXIT.” But no “ELEVATOR.” I ran into a rather old woman with a walker. She didn’t know where the elevator was. She was looking for her friend, who had gone downstairs a while ago and hadn’t come back yet.

As I wandered I saw a set of doors clearly marked “Employees Only!” and “Do Not Enter!” There was a woman standing in the doorway so I, assuming she was an employee, asked, “Is there an elevator?”

“Sure,” she said, “it’s in here. I’m just waiting for it.”

I wheeled the stroller in and looked where she was pointing. It was a freight elevator, one of those ones that’s just a platform going up and down with doors that pull down from the ceiling. Like in Felicity? The apartment Ben (I think) lived in in New York?

“Cool,” I said, “heh. That’s an old elevator all right.” The employee said nothing.

So okay, we’re waiting. Suddenly from behind me, I heard,

“EXCUSE ME!!!” Is there some rule somewhere about not bothering with niceties if you’re going to yell? There should be.

I backed out of the doorway.

“You have to wait OUT HERE,” said this belligerent little woman, “this area is for EMPLOYEES ONLY.”

Well obviously. I saw THAT sign. I just didn’t see the sign that explained the protocol of Very Old Elevator-in-a-Closet-Marked-Keep-Out-Customers-This-Means-You. Oh, there isn’t one? Funny.

“Sure,” I said. The other employee looked sympathetically at me, I think.

We got in and the nice one said, “Where are you going?”

“Uh, down,” I said, “please.”

“There’s a sign,” said the mean employee, pointing at the elevator wall, to which was taped a piece of looseleaf paper upon which was written in blue ballpoint pen, I suspect by someone whose job it was NOT:

1 = ladies clothing
2 = mens clothing, children
3 = housewares, furniture

“Great,” I said, “level 1, please.” With a hearty THUNK we hit the floor. “Thanks,” I said. And yes, the elevator smelled like pee. But not pot or armpit.

Naturally, the rubber boot selection was a disappointment. I didn’t so much care what cute pattern was on the boots. I would have bought the ones with ladybugs, flowers and hearts or the ones that were fuschia with blue trim (all only $17.99) if only they had fit me. Great, I said to Trombone, Now we have to go back up that damn elevator just to get out. Shoulda gone to Shoe Warehouse like Beth said. Trombone agreed. He had already been complaining strenuously for 20 minutes about being trapped in the stroller. So I took him out, strapped him into the Bjorn, up the escalator we went and HA Army & Navy’s Evil Elevator Troll was defeated!

Honestly A&N – could you look at an upgrade? 80% of the population in New Westminster is old enough and the other 20% is young enough that a properly functioning elevator (read: clearly marked and with either push-buttons or an operator who is not, frankly, mean as a hungry hound dog with a nail in her tail) would probably boost your sales, oh, at least $20 a month.

Then we took a quick jaunt across the street to the army surplus store, ’cause I had a sneaking suspicion they’d have what I wanted.

$20 boots in my size! And no elevators.

And now I have achieved my goal of using the most possible words in the universe to expand on something I could have said this easily:

“I hate elevators and I got new boots.”

(That’s funnier if you use that sentence to replace the line “I like Kevin Bacon but I hate Footloose” in the song Summer Girls by L.F.O. I’m just saying. If you need some funny.)