Saturday.
4:38 PM.
Whole Foods Market parking lot.
Already a hostile environment.
Every driver looked emotionally one flat tire away from appearing in a Netflix crime documentary titled Mildly Inconvenienced but Completely Unhinged.
I had been circling for at least six minutes. Maybe seven. Long enough to become spiritually invested in the concept of parking.
Then I saw it.
Brake lights.
A woman loading reusable grocery bags into the back of her Subaru like an angel sent directly from the organic produce section.
I flipped on my blinker and waited patiently like a mature adult while absolutely staring her car down with the intensity of a military sniper.
The Subaru started backing out.
This was it.
My moment.
My parking destiny.
And then…
Out of nowhere…
A tiny silver BMW came flying in from the opposite direction like it had been fired out of a rail gun.
No hesitation.
No conscience.
No respect for the fragile threads holding society together.
The driver whipped perfectly into the spot before the Subaru had even fully cleared.
Honestly?
Technically impressive.
Emotionally devastating.
The woman climbed out wearing sunglasses large enough to qualify as emergency storm shutters, glanced directly at me, gave a microscopic little “oops” shrug, and casually walked into the store like she hadn’t just committed a felony against human decency.
Now to be fair…
Nothing illegal had actually happened.
But spiritually?
Straight to jail.
At this point, I was no longer upset about the parking space itself.
Now it was about justice.
My brain instantly began producing fake revenge scenarios where I delivered devastatingly clever one-liners while nearby shoppers nodded in admiration and somebody slow-clapped near the avocados.
In my imagination, I became the brave moral hero of Parking Lot Ethics.
In reality?
I just sat there gripping the steering wheel in complete silence while internally writing a TED Talk titled:
“The Collapse of Civilization Starts in Parking Lots.”
And that’s when the uncomfortable truth hit me.
If the roles had been reversed…
If I had seen even the tiniest opening…
If there had been even a 3% chance I could’ve slid into that spot first…
There is a deeply concerning possibility I would’ve done the exact same thing.
Which honestly made me even more mad.
Not because she was terrible.
But because I suddenly realized the parking lot wasn’t full of villains.
It was full of exhausted people running low on patience, electrolytes, and emotional regulation.
Including me.
Especially me.
So instead of escalating the situation like the emotionally stable grown man I absolutely was not becoming in that moment…
I exhaled.
Kept driving.
Found a spot roughly twelve miles away.
And survived.
Barely.
Could I Have Been Less?
Probably.
The BMW move was aggressive.
But mentally turning a parking dispute into a societal collapse documentary may have been slightly excessive on my part.
Possibly.