Pressing my buttons...

Dear people that press the crosswalk button:

My name is Brian. I’m the guy that gives you an annoyed look every time you press the button at the crosswalk to instruct the light to change; ordering it to give you the right of way to cross the road. I am also the guy that snickers to myself when you begin to press the button more than once. The initial “tic, tic” sound of the button being pressed soon turns into “tic, tic, tic, tic, tic, tic, tic, tic.” And still, the light does nothing to help you cross the street.

Alright, time to come clean. I pressed that button… once. I remember where it was. I was at Front St. and John St. in downtown Toronto. I was late for work. I needed to cross the street. NOW (and by now, I mean THEN). The orange numbers on the cross walk counter were counting down the inevitable change of the light from red to green; from orange palm, to white man walking. 19. 18. 17. 16. Tic, Tic. "Yes! My Turn!" 15. 14. “Come on and change.” 13. 12. “Why are you doing this to me?” 11. 10. 9. “You’re really starting to piss me off, Button.” 8.7.6. “You’re seriously not going to ignore me, are you? 5. 4. 3. “They should really call you the piss off button…” Two. One. Amber light. Wait just a(nother) darn second. I pressed that button and nothing happened. The light ignored my pleas to change so I could part traffic and walk on through much like Moses did to that pool (I think that’s how the story went).

So there I was stomping and pouting as I made my way across the street and feeling like that light just laughed at me from above while I begged for permission to cross. From there on in, I began to watch people pressed the buttons.

People will get to a light right after they missed their crossing opportunity and press the button. I am guessing these people think traffic will just be ignored and that light will change back right away to allow them to cross. If buttons and lights could talk, I imagine their conversation would go something like this:

Button: Hey light, this guy wants to cross the street.
Light: Yea, I know, but I just changed though.
Button: Yes, but he wants to cross now.
Light: I have the countdown provided for him right there to tell him when he can cross, can’t he see that?
Button: Yes. He just doesn’t care though.
Light: ...Ok.

That button gives the pedestrian a false sense of hope. I am sure they do work at certain cross walks where one flow of traffic is severely out-numbered by the other flow of traffic leaving that button as the only source of summoning a change in traffic flow. I truly doubt though that in the downtown core, these buttons are even connected to anything. Never in my life have I seen a countdown heed in the pressing of a button.

I vow to continue to stare in the face of these button demons that do nothing to make my dreams come true. I will also continue to stare in astonishment while people type a Morse-code message using that large button that will ignore their pleas to cross the street. Look at the countdown. It doesn’t change. Think of the countdown as the: “on your mark, get set.” Then when that light changes on its own accord, regardless of how many times you press that button, you can: “GO!”


This same rant is applied to those that press the “door close” button on the elevator panel.