I’m not a great driver, evidence of this abounds, and so I try to remain understanding when it comes to the shortcomings of others on the road. But what I lack in motor skills (sometimes you find the pun, sometimes the pun finds you) I more than make up for with my commitment to parking as inoffensively as possible. I use an especially ancient art form called Touch Parking which means only knowing I’ve gone far enough in any particular direction when I touch something with Albus*. The only thing that gets punished in this process is my tyres (the guys at the local tyre place call me the Black Widow for a reason).
So even though I try not to judge people who cut me off, taxi drivers that almost impale me and the elderly in general, I cannot abide bad parkers (I’d say ‘hate’ but Mother Painefull drilled into me from an early age “We don’t hate people Painefull, we just dislike them intensely”). Sadly, my little street is littered with people who seem utterly convinced that kerbs, like corporations, are people too and thus must surely require personal space.
Yes Lexus, I’m talking about you.
You, that considers the stretch of road between car and sidewalk a second, equally sized pathway. You, that seems to be pining for angled parking in a one way street world. You, that, unless you were driven by someone who had to race off to give birth, put out a house fire, or SAVE MANKIND from an oncoming apocalypse, had no reason to come to rest in such a position that actually created genuine traffic build up whenever there was more than one car on the road (for two weeks).
Now no one wants a hive mind, and everyone deplores mob mentality, but there’s something more than a little satisfying when people find a common enemy. That’s why I couldn’t help but enjoy the fact that after weeks of miss-use someone finally left Lexus a note on his/her windscreen.
But it wasn’t actually deemed enough, and said note led to a metaphorical pile-on. Several people took it upon themselves to make additions to the note, voicing their very own concerns. There, scrawled in various pen inks and writing styles were a series of messages from a range of strangers on the one piece of paper. They all shared one theme – Dear Shit Parker, why would you be so selfish?
Mass rage satisfied in that polite, casual, indirect way we love in this very modern world, all went on with their daily lives as if they hadn’t taken part in a written protest flash mob. The verdict was delivered, shame was doled out. The Lexus behaves himself now.
Painefull Out
* = Albus is the name of my car. He’s an albino and, much like my pale-skinned self, is sensitive to sun, certain of global warming and irrationally angry about people who think a car horn is a birth right. With great power comes great responsibility.
