City Parking

TO AVOID PARALLEL PARKING, THE EUROVAN EXPLORES A VARIETY OF OPTIONS

“I refuse to parallel park the Eurovan,” I recently told a friend in San Francisco. “I will park a mile away from my destination, just to avoid it.”

“That’s ridiculous,” he said.

But I can explain. At age 16, my dad’s old Westphalia vanagon left an emotional scar on my confidence as a new driver. I failed my driver’s test before ever leaving the parking lot: I couldn’t parallel park. My mother tells me it was the first time I ever failed at anything. I wanted to blame the experience on the Volkswagen, but that evening, at a surprise birthday party thrown by a group of my best friends (most of whom already had their driver’s licenses), I learned to swallow my pride.

Walking into the party, my friends mixed greetings of “Surprise!” with giggles and:

“You failed your driver’s test!”

“Oh, Chase. ” 

“You really didn’t make it out of the parking lot?”

“We always new you were a spaz.”

And, again: “Oh, Chase,” coupled with exaggerated sighs.

Several months later, behind the wheel of a friend’s Jeep Cherokee, I passed my driver’s test. But here’s a little secret: I failed parallel parking again. The instructor told me that as long as I didn’t get any more points taken off, I could still pass the test. (And you can bet your ass I didn’t make any more mistakes).   

Over the last ten years, I religiously avoided parallel parking. It took some effort, but in San Francisco this last week, I managed to not break my record. Some evenings, one of the friends I was staying with would scout for large parking spaces that the Eurovan could back into. She would awkwardly park her Toyota, and then graciously move it to a smaller spot when the Eurovan arrived. Sometimes I would park seven, eight, nine blocks away and then walk to a friend’s apartment with my arms filled with my sleeping bag and pillow.

Here’s what I want to know: how many other dirtbags can’t parallel park their rigs? I have total confidence in those of you who grew-up in cities and drive Toyota Corollas, Honda Fits, and Subaru Legacies. But what about that big veggie oil Ford truck? Or that Dodge van? Or even that Toyota Tacoma?