**I wrote this post a few weeks ago but, as often happens, it got lost in the shuffle and just turned up now! I thought it was too embarrassing and ridiculous not to post though!
A few months ago, I signed on to work for a volunteer organization in Boston as a mentor. The BHERC is a program that provides mentoring services to kids in the Boston area to help them gain access to higher education and support they may not get from their immediate community. The organization is run by a church in Boston so the offices are in the church complex After work yesterday evening, I headed straight over to the South End in Boston to meet the middle school girl I will be mentoring.
Upon arriving at the church complex, I notice a large group of somber people lining the sidwalk outside the building and several cars painted. I'm confused at first, but quickly put together that there is a funeral going on at the church.
I start to feel a little awkward, given that I'm wearing a somewhat loud print shirt with a vaguely zebra-esque pattern and flip flops: clearly not funeral attire. I quietly make my way through the gathering throng of people, trying to look apologetic and slip into the church and onto the elevator as fast as I possibly can.
After meeting my mentor (a firecracker of a girl!) I prepare leave, but quickly realize I can't get back on the elevator I came up in because there are now people in the room I have to go through to get to it. Instead, I get on another elevator that I happen to notice. . .
I press the button for floor one and the elevator begins it's rickety, loud descent. We hit floor one and the elevator makes several loud bleeping noises before sliding open it's doors. Into the middle of the sanctuary. As the funeral is going on.
No one seems to be paying attention to me, as they are absorbed in the message the pastor is giving. Frantically, I jab at the buttons on the board, trying to close the doors and get up to the next floor where I can try and find some stairs.
The elevator chugs up to the next floor, and with a growing panic, I listen to the voice of the speaker and can tell that, while growing quieter, it's still very loud.
"Oh, God, please don't let this just be level two of the sanctuary!" I pray.
The doors begin their loud opening and I step over a bit out of the front of the doors. Now, I'm in what appears to be an overflow room. Thankfully, there's a half wall running along the back, blocking me from most people's view. Only a few eyes turn to pear at who's making the ruckus back by the elevator. I tiptoe-literally-out of the elevator and slink behind the wall to a door that has the red Exit sign above.
Ringing with embarrassment I wind down the stairs and ramps completely lost, but thankfully not interrupting the funeral. Finally, after an accidental tour of the basement of the church, directing a lost funeral goer to the bathrooms that I just past inadvertently and snaking back up one the of the walkways, I managed to find an EXIT.
I've never been so happy to get out of church in my life.
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