Skip to main content

Parallel Parking

I never had to drive a car in India so the only driving experience I have is in the US. It was a huge blessing for me that the state where I first got my license did not need me to demonstrate my non-existent prowess at parallel parking to give me a driver’s license. Had that been a condition of satisfaction for the road test, I would have most likely have never made the grade and gone back home where it is still possible to get oneself a full-time chauffer for a few thousand rupees a month. That would have proved the definitive end of my American Dream.

When it comes to parking, I never seek challenges and will park as far away at it takes from my destination to avoid anything that remotely resembles one. After all, walking half a mile never killed anyone. So when I go out with friends who can parallel park blind folded and will seek out the most punishing spots to hone their already razor sharp skills, I wait breathlessly for the deed to be done without hitting any bumpers. I am in awe of these people but will never try to emulate them. There is always the parking garage option for the likes of me. You either have the skills or pay your way out of your deficiencies. Sounds perfectly fair to me.

I've seen folks like NYT columnist Calvin Trillin in action. Even after decades of parking parallel they are in awe of what they can accomplish and will step out of the car to admire their handiwork. It helps have clueless people like me in attendance who will be rendered speechless by their feat. Despite ourselves we will go "Wow, how did you do that ?"

Comments

Anonymous said…
Well I too admire people who can parallel park effortlessly. This reminds me of my driving test. I was asked to parallel park but failed miserably. After this, in a funny kind of way the pressure to perform well, lifted and I drove without any further mistakes. Incredulously I passed the test and cynically wonder whether the short skirt(not intentionally) I had worn played any part in the outcome!!! Needless to say after 9 years of this test I am still unable to parallel park.

Jo

Popular posts from this blog

Part Liberated Woman

An expat desi friend and I were discussing what it means to return to India when you have cobbled together a life in a foreign country no matter how flawed and imperfect. We have both spent over a decade outside India and have kids who were born abroad and have spent very little time back home. Returning "home" is something a lot of new immigrants like L and myself think about. We want very much for that to be an option because a full assimilation into our country of domicile is likely never going to happen. L has visited India more often than I have and has a much better pulse on what's going on there. For me the strongest drag force working against my desire to return home is my experience of life as a woman in India. I neither want to live that suffocatingly sheltered existence myself nor subject J to it. The freedom, independence and safety I have had in here in suburban America was not even something I knew I could expect to have in India. I never knew what it felt t...

Under Advisement

Recently a desi dude who is more acquaintance less friend called to check in on me. Those who have read this blog before might know that such calls tend to make me anxious. Depending on how far back we go, there are sets of FAQs that I brace myself to answer. The trick is to be sufficiently evasive without being downright offensive - a fine balancing act given the provocative nature of questions involved. I look at these calls as opportunities for building patience and tolerance both of which I seriously lack. Basically, they are very desirous of finding out how I am doing in my personal and professional life to be sure that they have me correctly categorized and filed for future reference. The major buckets appear to be loser, struggling, average, arrived, superstar and uncategorizable. My goal needless to say, is to be in the last bucket - the unknown, unquantifiable and therefore uninteresting entity. Their aim is to pull me into something more tangible. So anyways, the dude in ques...

Carefree Wandering

There are these lines in Paul Cohelo's Alchemist that I love about the shepherd turning a year later to sell wool and being unsure if he would meet the girl there But in his heart he knew that it did matter. And he knew that shepherds, like seamen and like traveling salesmen, always found a town where there was someone who could make them forget the joys of carefree wandering. What is true of the the power of love and making a person want to settle is also true of  finding purpose in life. If and when a person is able to connect their work to purpose they care about, the desire for change disappears. They are able to instead channel that energy into enhancing the quality of the work they are already doing. As I write this, I remember S a brand manager I used to know a couple of decades ago. He worked for a company that made products for senior citizens, I was a consultant there. S was responsible for creating awareness of their new products and building awareness of what already ex...