Hunting...

I feel as if I’m on safari in Africa…stalking through rows and rows, eyes scanning back and forth over the landscape, my hands flinching and feet jumping at every sign of life.

Watching, waiting, hoping… and moving forward ever so slowly. Adrenaline pumping through my veins, anticipation my motivator, nervousness rushes me along…I can’t wait forever, yet I can’t leave until I get what I came for.

All of this is going through my head as I am…..

Looking for a parking spot! Parking is a very dicey issue at most Universities. It seems there are always hundreds more cars than there are white lines on the asphalt which they can fit between. Over the months I have learned much about the parking world at BYU- which lots fill up first in the mornings, which may have a few open spaces in the afternoons, which are patrolled the most, which open to all cars at which times, and which are “closest” to which buildings on campus.

I have avoided parking on campus in the dreaded afternoons, until this semester…where the hours of my job has forced me into what I call...THE HUNT.

I patrol the huge lot which provides the most direct (yet still too long) walking path to my class, watching the clock until the classes get out. Students slowly and sporadically filter through the rows and rows, strolling to their cars at a leisurely pace, while tense drivers hurriedly follow after them, stalking their prey relentlessly. Time is ticking down. I look up the hill and see the building where my class is about to start. So close, but yet so far…I cannot abandon my vehicle to race up the hill…My beloved Honda needs a shelter, a spot, a home, any place, anyone. The worst is when you drive after a student at a crawl, sure they’ll stop at a driver’s-side door very soon….but then, they pull a quick-one on you and cut through the row to the next one! With cars blocking my path and my vision, I gun the engine and speed around the corner into the next aisle, trying desperately to find them, and to my dismay there is another car with its blinker on, mocking me, ready to turn into the coveted space, the split-second the other car is out.

This is a real dilemma. What is to be done? On days when I don’t get dropped off at class by my wonderful husband…I’ve found that the only solution is to use something that takes up much less square footage…and runs on two things instead of four. Legs, bike, scooter, motorcycle…?