30 Things to Do Before I Turn 30

Date of Completion: October 2009

You know what’s unfortunate about street parking? Inevitably, you’ll have to parallel park. Unless you want to park blocks away and just walk the extra distance to save yourself the trauma and embarrassment.

Which is what I have always done.

I have parallel parked before. I was in Driver’s Ed. Which means it was a freaking long time ago. Once with cones, once with real cards, and I’d had my fill. But I’ve never done it without supervision. Or since I’ve had my actual license. I outright refused to do it. Parallel parking = scary.

Well it just so happens with my new residence that I have to park on the street. Usually there’s plenty of space and it’s not a problem. 

One night, however, one very fateful night, I came home, and someone down the street was having a gathering. The only parking space left on the street was between two cars across the street from my house. I was feeling brave. And didn’t want to have to find a different street to park on. And it seemed like a fairly spacious gap. I lined myself up with the front car and went for it. Fortunately, I’d been riding with my brother-in-law a couple of weeks prior, and he’d parallel parked into the same space, and I’d been observing him closely, mostly out of curiosity.

And, my dear bloglings, it was beautiful. It was a textbook parking job. I slid into the spot gracefully, evened my car out, squealed in excitement, and got out of my car to admire my feat. PERFECT spacing between all three cars. I refrained from doing a dance right there in the street (people were starting to come out of the party, after all), but I ran inside and texted a whole bunch of people and announced it in ALL CAPS on Twitter. The only bad thing was that it was, naturally, dark, and so I couldn’t take a picture.

I felt like I was in possession of a new superpower. I was unstoppable. I was unafraid to park anywhere. I did it a few more times, of course when it was too dark to take a picture, and it was awesome. I found myself actually kinda sorta maybe wanting to “have” to do it. But, see, I couldn’t count it yet. I needed photo documentation. Which I did actually  manage to get, but that’s a whole separate entry as to why I don’t have that one anymore.

The picture you see below, however, I would like to say – it was probably the most impressive feat ever. I didn’t have a wide open space between the two cars like the first time. It was exactly the right size, and that was it. No room for error. The odds of hitting either of the cars beside me were much higher (to be fair, one was my sister’s, and other than the fact that she was in the car with me, probably wouldn’t have been an epic tragedy). It took lots of maneuvering, a re-start, and lots of tiny backs & forths… and lo! It was magical. It was also dark, again.

But, the next morning, both cars were still there so I could finally take the damn picture that I’d been wanting. PROOF!