Parking Wars, Fernwood Style

Many of you have either seen or heard of the show Parking Wars on cable...well, nearly had one here this morning. It didn't involve the city parking folks, just our apartment building. I came back from errands this morning to a huge blue commercial truck in my parking space. We have no visitor spaces, so it left me with nowhere to park but someone else's parking space, or leave my van in the middle of the lot and go looking for the driver to ask him to park on the street. I first knocked on R.'s door, the nosey old man from upstairs who gave me the night stand and lamp. He is the self-appointed unrecognized and unpaid caretaker of the complex...he is also very crochety...when I was tumbling the ghetto sofa down over the bank to the street curb, he roared out the window at me. Well, today was much worse. He knew who owned the truck, and said to knock on the apartment next door - A. the older lady who brought me the butt ugly blouse a few weeks back. I knew A. drove a convertible so it had to be a visitor of hers, so I knocked on her door. I explained to her that I wanted to park in my space and who owned the blue truck in my space. She didn't say who it was, just that he had often parked there because the space wasn't being used. Um, I USE IT. It is my parking space, which you know, and I have been here a month now, parked in that space day and night, right across from your space. So once we clarified that, we were wrapping up and before I knew it R. came BUSTING out of his door, YELLING and SCREAMING at A. for the parking issue. It was like an explosion out of nowhere...clearly these two have some history...he wasn't yelling at me, but I was still afraid, given his calm demeanor just two minutes before when I knocked on his door. I was so blown away he got out a few sentences before I told him gently that I did not need his help, I could handle this, and please go back into your apartment. Which he did, immediately - surprise surprise. A. said he has always been like that, but didn't elaborate. There is likely a story there, but I don't want to get involved in it at all. Such unnecessary drama...

So I went down to my van, started 'er up and then waited for blue truck driver to move his truck, which he did quite quickly, and then pulled into my space. On my way back, I saw A. reporting the scene to J., the Brit next door, while J. was pacing the parking lot next door with a smoke in her bathrobe....parking wars, Fernwood style.