So, you are walking through a parking lot. Any parking lot. Walking past row upon row of immaculately parked cars and then you see THAT car. You know, the car that is parked inches away from the car on the left side, so close that the driver had to clamber over the console and exit the right side door to take advantage of the the abundance of unoccupied space on that side. The rear of the vehicle juts awkwardly out into the lane and is an impediment and a general nuisance to oncoming traffic, and a source of scorn to pedestrians.
That would be my car. Mmmhmm.
Everyone tells me that parking is an acquired skill. Liars. Every last one of them. It never really occurred to me that nobody else seems to have this problem until I was talking to one of my friends who got her license like maybe a month ago. "Yeah," Allie said, "my parking isn't even awkward anymore." I think my jaw almost hit my chest. And Allie drives a truck that is bigger than mine, so don't try and tell me that she drives a car so it's easier for her, or some junk like that. You either can park a car, or you can't. It's a skill you're born with. There's probably a gene for it.
Basically, I have 'parking envy'...I watch people whip into parking spaces perfectly straight-- a wonderful blend of precision and speed, and I sigh. Why can't I just park? They can just do it...it is like a light, fresh spring breeze. My parking? Well, it's more like someone trying to dock a ship.
Yesterday, I went to the grocery store, or maybe it was at church or something, but where it was was totally irrelevant because I had to park. Grant was with me and I parked, and turned off the truck. "Oh my gosh." Grant said. "What?" I really did want to know what had caused my brother to say that in such a tone of quiet awe. "You just parked and didn't have to back out of the space." It was a profound moment. We both sat and absorbed it for about three seconds and then we went and bought a bunch of milk (okay, so that was the grocery store.) The whole point of that is that decent parking jobs are few enough for me to be seriously notable to my normally sarcastic brother. That's not good.
Now what's really fun is my bi-monthly sojourn to pick up horse feed. That's where I have to back into a parking space to have feed loaded. I always manage to back up to a pole so that they can't open the back of my truck. And it's always the same person who loads the feed, so I'm like, "Wait, I'm really sorry, I can fix that. Really." I'm fairly sure he hates me and that I ruin his week. But that's his problem because I was born like this. Sad, but true.
If you are like me, I'm really sorry. It's hard to come to terms with. But you can do it. The first step is admitting you have a problem. We might even be able to start a support group.
*this post is dedicated to pull-through parking spaces.
