Lucia's Parking by Mia Lowry

When we lived in Yuma and were little girls going to the store with our mother we would often complain at her parking practices. It did not matter which store we were going to do some shopping the parking practice was the same. As soon as we pulled into K-mart, Fedmart, Yellowfront or the Pic 'N Save strip mall she would park.

We would complain about the LONG walk to the store because she parked at the first spot next to the street we just came off of to enter the lot. We would see all the many spaces near the store and point them out to her. "There's one. Why couldn't we park here. See how close it is to the store!" She would smile and say, "We need our exercise. This is good for us." Of course, we would complain about how much our legs hurt and how we did not need exercise.

It wasn't until years later I found out why she would do this 'peculiar parking' habit. She told me she was nervous about parking next to other vehicles; so, she would find the furthest spot knowing the likely hood of a car parking next to her was zero. I laughed and borrowed her method when our family vehicle was the Red Chevy Long Bed truck. I know that Tonie borrows this method sometimes when she drives her Porshe, but not because she can't park. She does it to keep people from hitting her car and chipping her paint job.