The Parking Pecking Order

Dear Neighbors,

We're cordial, right?  I mean, we always say hi to each other when we pass in the carport and I make silly faces and coo over your adorable children.  When you're playing with them down stairs you sound like really great parents, which is so refreshing after hearing our other neighbors, The Cranky Smoker and His Cranky Wife, yelling at their kids all day long for things like not walking fast enough or laughing too much. You're not loud, like the Gypsies upstairs, and you both seem like responsible, agreeable adults.

So it pains me to tell you that we're totally in a fight right now. And over something as petty as parking. But my hands are tied - you've crossed a line.

Each apartment has two cars but only one assigned spot. And for years now the three free covered parking spots have usually been filled by me or Katie, The Cranky Smoker's Camaro, and whoever is the senior most resident upstairs.  Listen, I know it's not technically our spot, it's anyone's spot, but for years we have been parking in those spots.  And you have been parking over on the side.  YEARS!  And it's not like the three of us switch around, we always park in the exact same spots.  So I don't understand why you're suddenly changing this up.  Or why, specifically you have decided that it's our spot that you're going to take.  Is it because of the Cranky Smoker?  Yeah, I'm afraid of him too (and the lung cancer he is trying to give me).  Is it because the other guy is really big and has tattoos?  Helpful hint:  he's super nice.  But that still does not mean that I'm going to take his spot!  Because there's this unwritten law, you know?  I'm not saying that there is a pecking order, but there is so a pecking order! And for the record, I can't help it if I happen to get home at a time when it is free and I take it. 

Okay, so whatever.  You take it from time to time.  I'm not going to begrudge someone flexing their renter's right to covered parking.  That is not what this fight is about.  What it is about is that fact that for the last week your car has been parked in that spot while your assigned spot has been empty.  Did you seriously just go on vacation and leave your car in a prime parking spot?  For a week?!  And Camaro and Big Guy haven't budged.  Which means that every morning Katie or I wander around the building trying to remember which rando spot we had to park in the night before.

So whenever you come back from wherever you are (Martha's Vineyard?  Fire Island?) just know that I will still say hi to you and coo over your cute kids, but my heart is stone.

Cordially (or so I thought),

Rachel

PS. I hope everything is okay and you didn't have to rush away for an emergency.  I would feel bad about that.  Gah!  Why can't I stay cranky like The Cranky Smoker?  He would be seething if it were his spot you were taking.  He'd raise it to 10 packs a day as opposed to his usual 9, just to spite you.