I Can Laugh About This Now....

I can laugh about this now, but it was scary when it happened and left me a little stressed out and tired. My work has moved to a newly renovated building that is three times bigger than the previous building. Well, they had just newly programmed the new alarm system and I was to be the first person to close the building one evening last week. This is what happened...

I closed the office and then went around the building to make sure that the crucial doors were closed. Then I went to the first floor lobby by way of the stairs and proceeded to set the alarm. It started beeping loudly and gave a message that a door was open somewhere in the building. So, I go running up and down the stairs and all through the place closing every single door in the whole place...felt like 50 doors. Then I close the door at the top of the stairwell, hurry down the stairs for the fifth time only to find the door at the bottom of the stairwell leading to the lobby locked and I can't open it! Then I run back up to the top of the stairs to find the door at the top locked and I can't open it either!!! That's when I panicked and realized that I'd left my purse and cell phone outside of the stairway beyond the locked door in the first floor lobby. For a good five minutes or maybe longer I thought that I was trapped with no way to alert anybody. It was scary. Then I gathered my senses enough to really look around and saw an emergency exit behind the stairs.

Whew! Then I was able to leave the building and fortunately had my car keys in my pocket! It all turned out OK in the end and I got home and was able to retrieve my purse, but it was such a scary thing to feel trapped like that! I even had a blister on my foot from running up and down the stairs and down the hallways so many times.

So, have you ever been stuck in an elevator or in a building? I've always been a little worried about elevators, but never thought that I'd have to be concerned about a stairwell!