Parking Etiquette Please advise me on parking etiquette because I have a long and salty history with parking altercations and am repeatedly involved in nasty situations. It is my goal to learn how normal, in-control and polite people handle these situations and to alter my behavior in a way that makes me proud of myself and does not leave me “roiling” (see sleeping pill essay) in reproaches in the night when I should be sleeping.

Parking situations dot my day-to-day life to such an extent that I would never consider trying to document them, much less boring a reader with multiple accounts of disputes that have the same ending. However, to give you a flavor of what typically happens I will give you two examples that illustrate usual parking encounters for me.  One example stands out in a particularly descriptive way because it involves two elected officials and a fair amount of graveling. 

About 15 years ago I worked for the fourth ranked Texas elected official and my office building shared a parking garage with the Texas Supreme Court. One day I parked in a parking place and went to work. When I returned to my car an unnamed Supreme Court Justice had parked within an inch of my car.  Seriously, I could not have squeezed my purse between the two cars. I had to get into the passenger side of my car and crawl over the seat to the driver’s seat.  It was a hot Texas day and I was wearing a skirted suit as I hoisted myself over the gearshift. Needless to say, I was livid and decided that the best way to handle the situation was to write the violator a note describing my feelings about this parking etiquette.  Having no idea that I was addressing a justice for the Texas Supreme Court the note began with “Dear Asshole” and went downhill from there.

The Supreme Court justice, who in short description was a pasty-skinned, pompous, fundamental, self-righteous Bible beater, wasted no time in identifying me as the writer of the note and contacted my office’s chief of staff who then contacted the office-holder.  A meeting followed in which I was asked how I would repair the potential political damage. A nice note tempered with a fair amount of graveling and some store-bought cookies remedied the situation and apparently appeased the justice, but as I lay in my bed “roiling” and punishing myself for such out-of-control anger, I rationalized that truly the judge was an asshole. The clincher is that when I got married this now retired judge turned out to be a friend to  my father-in-law. The judge and I met again on several social occasions and either he is really decent or he has significant memory loss and bad recall. He acts as if we have never met before.  I’m pretty sure (hopeful) he doesn’t recognize me.

Another parking situation that shows me in a bad light -- and honestly if I wanted to preserve my dignity, I would not repeat this story, but I’m emotionally honest and want to fess up to my transgressions in order to become the evolved person I have a distance hope of becoming – is a tale that pits me against an elderly, frail woman. 

I parked my car in the Michael’s parking lot exactly between the yellow parking stripes and said elderly woman pulled in beside me so close that I could barely open my door. Obviously, the first line of action was to make eye contact and hope that she would move her Buick so I could get out of my car, but she didn’t respond—cataracts, I presume.  The second course of action I took was to open my car door the full four inches available and squeeze my head out and call to her as she walked from her car to the store. 

Sincerely I called to the lady and said, “Excuse me, mam???  Uh, you parked so close that I can’t get out of my car.”  Expecting the woman to be mortified and apologize and move her car, I was shocked when the old bag accusingly looks at me, my car and then walks behind my car and says, “You can move over a little bit.” 

What!? How did I become the person who needed to move? I was in the parking lines and I was there first!  I’m shocked as the haggard old bitty walks into the store and leaves sitting in my car like a ninny. Clearly I have not learned my lesson about writing mean notes because I whip out some paper and write: 

You crotchety old woman.  When you sit on your beige couch wondering why you have no friends and your family doesn’t want to be around you, just think about how stubborn and mean you are then you’ll know the answer.

While I would love to say that I felt really good about writing that note, I “roiled” over it for many nights. So, last night when I found myself in yet another parking situation, I REALLY tried hard to handle it right.  My husband was driving and my mother and children were riding in the backseat.  It’s about 5:30 and we are waiting on a car to pull out of a spot on a fairly busy side street.  Patiently we wait and have pulled to the side of the street so as not to block traffic. The car’s turning signal is on to indicate that we will be taking the spot when it becomes available.  To my shock and complete disbelief a sporty Mercedes whips around us and pulls into the spot when the other car evacuates!

I hop out the idling car and instead building speed with a quick run and diving over the hood of the woman’s car like a Charlie’s Angel and wrestling the woman to ground, ripping her earrings out of their holes, I calmly, assertively and politely say, “Oh, excuse me. We have been waiting for that spot.  You must not have noticed.”  Of course, you think I’m going to say that she put her hand over her mouth and gasped and said in an embarrassed voice, ‘Oh, my goodness. I am so sorry. How awkward. Let me move right now.”  Nope.  She cocks her curling-ironed blonde locks and says, “Oh, well, I’m just going to the cleaners and it won’t take very long.”

In her cropped, cuffed, culottes and high-heeled boots she smirks at me and tosses her head at my gaping look of astonishment. “It’s not a big deal. I’ll just be a minute.”  Still trying to manage my anger, I say something lame like, “I’ll just tell my hungry toddler and aged mother that they’ll need to wait a little longer until you get back from the cleaners!”  Fucking imported, empty-headed bitch has the audacity to say, “Fine,” and treks off the cleaners while I look like Pamela Pushover in front of my family.  I guess assuming the role of Pamela Pushover instead of Rosanne Barr allowed me to avoid considerable “roiling” last night, but it was a painful thirty minutes as the humiliation of being bossed by a ho-bag from the suburbs sunk into my being. 

Maybe while I slept peacefully last night that be-atch sat in her bed reading a plastic surgery brochure and was unable to concentrate as she recalled the unbearable horribleness of her rude and self-centered action.  More than likely though that egocentric, fur-vest-wearing whore just penned Dr. Liftandtuck’s phone number on her to do list, popped an Ambien, pulled down her blackout shades and went to sleep.

Comments

[Glennia]

This happened to me when I was 8 1/2 months pregnant. An old lady parked about 2 inches away from me on the driver's side and an old man parked 4 inches from me on the passenger side. I had to sit on the curb and wait for one of them to emerge from the post office to glare at the old lady. Wish I'd had the guts to write her a note or confront her, but instead I was mad about it for days. In fact, my kids is now 6 and I'm still pissed. Does Ambien really work?

Love your blog!

[zane]

I love this post! I had some problems in our parking lot with people parking too close for comfort. I didn't say anything. I just parked too close for their comfort the next time. It never happened again.

My advice...walk away. Seriously. I don't fight every battle I'm invited to...ok, I'm gettin' better at it. And it leaves me more time for the battles I want and more time with the people I want to spend.

That's the plan anyway. And it works out most of the time...