I wonder.

     As I'm riding our sometimes sketchy elevator to the second floor of our apartment complex as the sun is setting after work, or as I'm hurrying to the elevator in the morning as the sun is changing the sky from orangey pinks to sunny blue (or lately as it's just overcast grey), I find myself wondering what the stories are from the people who live around us. Like on of our neighbors who leaves the house around 8/9pm most nights (a late night job I assume) but is home in the morning to take his 2 girls to school and then is greeted by joyous cheers of "Daddy!" when he gets home in the evening, or the ones who leave heartbroken in the morning as their baby screams after them when left with the sitter, or the guy who is always outisde of the parking garage on his cell phone, or our neighbors with the cute little dog who I can only assume are relatively newly married (I like to think they have the same goal as we do), or the owners of the $100k+ cars in an apartment. That always takes me back to my econ class my senior year of highschool. I wonder about their lives, about their stories, how they got to where they are; I wonder if their Christians, what they believe, what their goals are. But most of the time, there's no interactions - most of the time I find myself in the elevator alone - which surprises me and on the occassions in which there's company in the elevator, there's awkward small talk in the 30-45 second trip up the floors. I wonder when I'll figure out how to really talk with people in an elevator situation, and more than that - I wonder why elevator situations always seem awkward.