Mitch Can’t Find a Parking Spot

Mitch can’t find

A parking spot

So he’s going home

He’s not going home sullen

He’s not going home to pout

He’s not going home upset

He is, in fact,

Going home

So that none of those other things

Come to be

He is not going to get mad

He is going to go home

When he gets home

He’ll be asked

If he got what he wanted

At the mall

And he’ll say ‘No’

He didn’t

Because he couldn’t find

A parking spot

And whereas

If you think about it

That should be

A perfectly reasonable explanation

For why

Someone should decide to go home

It will be treated

In this context

As proof of mental instability

Of lunacy

Of immaturity

Of selfishness

Forget that the thing at the mall

Was for him

Not anybody else

Forget that

Everybody tells him

He needs to do something

About his high blood pressure

Forget that

Since he was a child

People have been telling him

To walk away

From conflict

To go cool down somewhere

Forget all that

Because if you can’t find

A parking spot

You’re just supposed

To deal with it

You’re supposed to

Keep driving

Around and around

Until somebody leaves

And then park a thousand miles away

From where you need to be

Fuming the entire time

Blood pressure sky high

Furious and not breathing properly

Until you collapse from a heart attack

In the check-out line

This is what’s expected of you

And because Mitch

Looked at all that

And said--

‘No thanks’

He will be castigated

He will be criticized

He will be complained about

There is no winning
When you are Mitch

No winning

And most of all

No parking

No parking anywhere

Mitch drives home

Noticing, on the way,

That there are no spots anywhere

Cars occupy ever available space

Cars and trucks and vans

Motorcycles even

Had he tried to anywhere at all

He would have been met

With the same problem

He faced at the mall

When he arrived home

There were cars in front of his house

All down his street

Parked in front of his garage

On his lawn

On the lawns of his neighbors

Everywhere

Mitch put his car in park
Right there in the middle of the street

Another car arrived behind his

And parked

Another drove the wrong way

Down the road

And stopped two inches away

From his front fender

There was nowhere to go

And Mitch felt like

That was all right

For the first time

In a long time

He felt great about

Having absolutely nowhere

To go