“You feel as if you’ve stepped back to when the cars driving by were Packards rather than Priuses. ” – John King
I’m trying desperately to hold my mind together. We all are here in this senior housing since most of us have watched a dear one swirl down into Alzheimers and thus have as our greatest fear, that that will happen to us.
So we take active measures. We organize our lives so that we’re actively using our minds in our hobbies and entertainment. We gather on Tuesday afternoons to play word games at which, in spite of my background, i’m only average. Anything to stave off Alzheimers. But of course, we’re old and what comes with that, outside of Alzheimers, is forgetfulness and less attention to detail, which we try to counter by making shopping lists, to-do lists, and notes to ourselves all over the apartment.
But sometimes all that is not enough. Don’t tell Becky, but Thursday before last as i left the apartment building in a rush on the Segway, i realized that i would not be available the following morning when the street sweeper came, so in a moment of cleverness to avoid a $75 ticket, i simply moved the car to a long open space across the street with the intent of moving it back to my side of the street on Friday night, where it would be safe until two Fridays hence.
And then, on Saturday morning i went out to move the car and couldn’t find it anywhere along the other side of the street. Who would steal a fifteen-year-old Prius? i wondered. And then another thought popped up. Had i somehow parked wrong and got myself towed? The SFMTA has made checking on that easy, just plug your plate number in, and you can see a history of your infractions going back five years, and yep, there it was at the top, i’d been towed.
Somehow in my haste, i’d backed up into the wrong end of that long parking place and was so momentarily insane that i didn’t look to see that the end i’d chosen was in front of someone’s driveway.
When i added it all up – the ticket, the towing charge, the storage charge, the wear and tear on the tow truck, the hourly wage for the ticketer and the tower, dry cleaning for the officer’s uniforms, the lunch they deserved after all that work, more storage charges because i didn’t ransom out the car on the day it was towed, and a few more trifling items, the bill came to $900, which will impact my entertainment budget for quite some time. And there i was, thinking about finally treating myself to State Bird Provisions. Maybe next year.
But hey, lest you think i’m in the habit of such ridiculous errors, the last time i was towed was in 2009 when Rina was visiting, and it was all her fault because i was enjoying her so much that i didn’t notice that TOWAWAY ZONE sign. And the last time before that was in 1974 when i was visiting the city and was having a wonderful time in the Buena Vista Cafe with my friend Dick while my car was being towed for commute hours on Bay Street.
Meanwhile, there is some resentment among the lower orders here against the rich newcomers driving up rental rates.
