Notes left on cars should fall into one of two categories: 1) I’m sorry I smashed your side mirror call me, or 2) 25% off Psychic Palm Reading. A hot pink handwritten post-it declaring “Terrible Parking” does not fall into either of these.
First, the facts. This was a grocery store parking lot, spots tightly crammed together, and I pulled in between two sedans, so it couldn’t have been that bad let’s be realistic.
Did the author of Post-It: A Memoir in Two Words try to pull in next to me but couldn’t? Did my slightly slanted parking job trigger her obsessive-compulsive disorder? Was she unhappy that the store ran out of muesli? Did she leave a note in the produce section because the carrots were not arranged in a perfect pyramid?
I bet she was talking on the phone at checkout.
My daughters had jumped in the back seat before seeing the note, so after I got in the car, I turned around to show them. “Guys, look what someone left me.”
“That’s mean,” said the younger one.
“Did you do a bad job parking?” asked the preteen.
“You tell me. Come look.” The three of us got out of the car and stood behind it, tilting our heads and staring at the back bumper as if it were contemporary art.
It was not my finest work but terrible? Please. I’ll tell you something terrible. There are these duck-like birds called coots that live at the lake near my house. When coot chicks beg their mother for food, the mother sometimes pecks or starves them to death. That’s terrible. I sometimes mention the fate of these birds to my children when they start asking me when dinner will be ready.
“I guess you’re a little over to one side,” said the younger one, peeling a cheese stick.
“Who would write a note like that?” said the preteen, having rejoined Team Mom.
We got back in the car, buckled in, and started to back up. “That’s her! That’s her!” said the younger one excitedly, pointing to a woman walking past holding a bouquet of sunflowers. I told her it’s impossible to tell and she said, “Well she looks grumpy. I bet she did it.”
“Should I roll down the window and yell, ‘Terrible Flowers!’ at her?” I asked my children, who were instantly horrified by the reminder that their mother is always mere seconds away from extreme embarrassment.
“Mom! Don’t!”
I asked them what sort of note would have been more helpful to leave on someone’s car window. I suggested something like, “Next time, please park more towards the center of your spot. It made it difficult to pull out. Thanks.”
“How about no note?” they said. No note would have been fine too.