It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time

Just after the New Year, my work computer started acting strangely. Our relationship gradually deteriorated until it barely responded to me, finally sending me a desperate plea to insert a disk into its drive or it would dump our memory. Although my mind told me to back up my files first, like a scene from a horror movie where the possessed hand has an evil mind of its own, I witnessed myself shutting the computer off even as my brain was thinking “NO!”

Anyone who knows me, knows I’m always full of great ideas. Or more specific, I’m full of a couple of good ideas, surrounded by lots of crappy ideas that probably shouldn’t be acted upon, an impulse I’m still trying to control. And as I continue the long and painful process of recreating every file I’ve ever used for the past 20 years lost in the aforementioned computer meltdown, I started to think about other times my impulsive nature has gotten me into trouble.

Back in grade school, my early aspirations to be a writer combined with my lack of popularity resulted in what I thought was a fantastic idea to write a murder mystery incorporating my classmates as characters. It worked like a charm, and my star was rising with each page in my pathetic plan to make me the pinnacle of popularity. That is until one of my main characters told me I looked like “a pig at a luau”, causing me to go home and promptly set my hand written manuscript on fire, along with the flowered shirt that inspired the comment. I immediately knew this was a bad idea, but it was too late to save the cremated copy. At the time, I thought ‘they’ would all be sorry. But the only thing that ended up being sorry was myself, as I burnt what was evolving into a pretty good murder mystery, killing with it my reputation.

I would love to attribute this impish impetuousness to the silliness of my youth, but after decades of debacles, one of my biggest blunders was yet to come.

In fall of 2001, the anthrax scare was in high alert following a letter sent to news anchor Tom Brokaw, which included the deadly substance, described in the news report as ‘brown and granular’. Shortly after, one of my co-workers at the Boston Herald showed me a newspaper he had found in our cafeteria, with a similar looking substance sandwiched inside our sports section. As we debated whether it was anthrax or bran muffin crumbs, I grabbed the substance and inhaled it to prove how sure I was that it was safe. Later that night, still isolated with my co-worker in the HR office while the Hazardous Materials Team tested the substance and news trucks waited out front for the results (it was indeed a bran muffin), my only response to their repeated questioning about why a manager would inhale what my co-worker suspected was a lethal substance was “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

Those who say actions speak louder than words have not heard some of my classic faux pas, which literally scream out “Could you please help me remove my foot from my mouth”. These include the time I told an employee I loved her Halloween costume only to find out she wasn’t wearing one, bumping into a business associate in downtown Salem on a Saturday morning saying I hardly recognized her without makeup as she told me she just had a makeover and gestured to the beauty store right behind her, and asking a co-worker from another department when her baby was due again, only to be told her daughter was now 4 months old.

Every now and then, though, one of my brainstorms turns into brilliance, including ten years ago when I got the bright idea I could run the Boston Marathon. I could not run a mile at the time and had no clue what special joys winter training in New England would bring. But thanks to friends who shared my uneducated and unadulterated, albeit naïve, enthusiasm towards this goal, I can’t imagine the past 10 years of my life without running. My all time favorite marathon training memory remains a bitterly cold, early morning run in February 2003. As my friend Lisa’s ponytail froze into a concussion causing clump and my eyelashes sported icicles, I turned to her and stated the obvious, “This seemed like a good idea at the time…”

And as it turned out, it was.

Can't We All Just Get Around?

There are about 4 million people born in America each year, and I have no idea where they are all going to park. I use to think that the fear of not finding a parking spot was reserved for older, fragile folks with mobility issues. Lately, however, this concern has become more cross-generational than geriatric.

Pulling into the parking lot at a popular local grocery store on a weekend afternoon, I join the creeping caravan of cars circling the lot, like a macabre game of metallic musical chairs. At the twinkle of a taillight, every car within a quarter mile puts their blinker on to indicate ownership of the soon to be vacant spot, including the car in front of you who slams their car into reverse as they send you the death stare, daring you to pull in and suffer the unspoken consequences, leaving me to wonder if a sale on laundry detergent is worth the wrath of road rage.

I decide to forgo my food shopping for now, and instead head to downtown Salem, where I quickly find that the percentage of cool shops and restaurants cropping up in the city is disproportionate to the number of parking spots to accommodate potential customers. Lack of parking is like the cold shower of impulse buying, putting a damper on your shopping desires once you realize that while you can see the object of your desire, you just can’t get there.

Working in South Boston, I should be use to this. During our woeful winter of 2011, I once drove around an entire block of empty parking spots being reserved with everything from air conditioners to beach chairs to a set of golf clubs; a giant frigid flea market where customers were not welcomed. I slowly circled past the store I had intended to shop at, once, twice, three times before finally retreating back to work, wondering if what our economy really needs to get it going is more parking spaces.

Then there’s Cambridge, where resident parking is so rare that once you find a space, you try your best to never drive again. Cars sit in their prime parking spots like old trophies, glory long gone, plowed in by snow banks in the winter and collecting dust in the spring, while their owners commute on the T, beg friends for rides and walk for miles telling anyone who will listen about the great parking spot they found right outside their door 2 years ago, where their car still sits.

Near the Boston Herald, there are a handful of free, non-metered, non-posted parking spaces that have remained overlooked by the city, an oasis in the desert. Each morning, there is a line of double-parked cars, their rhythmic blinkers signaling in unison, as they await the exit of a night shift employee to snatch their parking prize. Unfortunately, the entrance to the Herald parking lot is in the midst of this parking panic, and each day as I slowly drive pass them with my blinker on, they mistakenly assume I am trying to cut into their territory, and their silently swearing faces behind their windows remind me of the wedding scene in The Graduate. Good morning to you, too!

Several years ago, a friend of mine lived in Nahant near Short Beach, and I had an open invite to join her on any given weekend at this beautiful spot. Which sounded great until I realized there are no legal non-resident all day parking spots within walking distance. After multiple stake-outs and failed attempts, including a disastrous and embarrassing shot at strapping my beach chair to my back and riding my bike, I finally discovered there is exactly one parking space walking distance from the beach where you can stay all day without a resident sticker and without getting a parking ticket. Even though my friend has long since moved, I sometimes drive by my prized spot to see if it remains free for all. Where is it you ask?

Nice try, but that’s my spot.