Parking Lot Wars
If you think it is difficult to park at the mall during the holiday season, try to find a parking place anytime at the West Los Angeles Veterans Administration Medical Center. Now that's difficult.
I am a veteran, proud of my ten years on active duty and as the result of a service-connected disability, entitled to free medical care from the V.A. However, I have not availed myself of that medical care for 14 or 15 years, due to the wonderful health insurance benefits provided by my employer of almost 17 years.
I had no plans to go back to the V.A. for care either, but I recently quit that aforementioned job and next summer my employer will stop paying for my health insurance benefits. So, unless I find another job with benefits in the interim, next July I will once again need that free medical care the V.A. provides me.
That is why I drove over to the West L.A. facility the other morning. I went by to visit the two Veterans service organizations that I am eligible to join, to get information on what steps I need to take to get my V.A. coverage turned back on.
The last time I had been to that facility, parking had not been a problem. Well, times have changed. In the main lot, there were at least seven cars circling around like vultures, waiting for someone to emerge from the big building and get into a car and vacate a space. I was almost afraid to try and join the circling mob, for fear one of the other drivers would take exception to my presence. So instead, I headed for one of the overflow lots.
Of course, there were drivers circling in that lot too, but not as many. Only two and one of those thought he was quite clever, parking at the end of a long row of vehicles in a space that was clearly painted "No Parking". I wonder how clever he thought he was when he eventually returned to his car and found the parking ticket that a V.A. Police Officer left on the windshield about five minutes after the car had been parked there illegally.
I did eventually find a space, in yet another lot on the far side of the building, in the row furthest from the building. As I pulled into the slot, I felt as though I had just won the lottery. I got out, locked the door and went into the building, sure that everything was downhill from there. It wasn't.
I was there to see two different people, in two different offices that fortunately for me are located right next to each other, and are quite easy to find. When I arrived at those offices, both were closed and locked. Both of the doors had notes on them that indicated that the occupants were out and would be back later. One, an hour later, the other, two hours later.
There were comfortable chairs there, and a cafeteria down the hall and I could have just waited, or gone and eaten. For a brief moment, I even pondered the possibility of leaving and returning in an hour, after running a much needed errand. Then I realized that returning in an hour would mean having to try once again to find a vacant parking space and there was no way I was going to deal with that nightmare again anytime soon, let alone again on that day.
So I wrote down the phone numbers of the people I was there to see and decided that I would try to get them on the phone and get my questions answered that way, even though it may take weeks to finally get through.
Then I walked back to my car. Of course, someone circling in the lot saw me emerge from the building and followed me back to my car. In fact, two different cars followed me back to my own vehicle, from two different directions. As I got into my car, the two drivers sat there, glaring at each other. Both were waiting to see which way I would back out, each waiting for the slightest opening to race forward into the newly vacant parking spot and cut the other off in doing so.
Not wanting to witness a parking lot accident, I backed out slowly and deliberately, blocking one of the two cars from moving forward into the now open space. Maybe I was unfair and should have just let the two of them fight it out. But I had seen enough fighting among veterans for one day. So, for that one brief moment, I forced peace into the parking lot wars. Then, mission accomplished, I headed home.
I am a veteran, proud of my ten years on active duty and as the result of a service-connected disability, entitled to free medical care from the V.A. However, I have not availed myself of that medical care for 14 or 15 years, due to the wonderful health insurance benefits provided by my employer of almost 17 years.
I had no plans to go back to the V.A. for care either, but I recently quit that aforementioned job and next summer my employer will stop paying for my health insurance benefits. So, unless I find another job with benefits in the interim, next July I will once again need that free medical care the V.A. provides me.
That is why I drove over to the West L.A. facility the other morning. I went by to visit the two Veterans service organizations that I am eligible to join, to get information on what steps I need to take to get my V.A. coverage turned back on.
The last time I had been to that facility, parking had not been a problem. Well, times have changed. In the main lot, there were at least seven cars circling around like vultures, waiting for someone to emerge from the big building and get into a car and vacate a space. I was almost afraid to try and join the circling mob, for fear one of the other drivers would take exception to my presence. So instead, I headed for one of the overflow lots.
Of course, there were drivers circling in that lot too, but not as many. Only two and one of those thought he was quite clever, parking at the end of a long row of vehicles in a space that was clearly painted "No Parking". I wonder how clever he thought he was when he eventually returned to his car and found the parking ticket that a V.A. Police Officer left on the windshield about five minutes after the car had been parked there illegally.
I did eventually find a space, in yet another lot on the far side of the building, in the row furthest from the building. As I pulled into the slot, I felt as though I had just won the lottery. I got out, locked the door and went into the building, sure that everything was downhill from there. It wasn't.
I was there to see two different people, in two different offices that fortunately for me are located right next to each other, and are quite easy to find. When I arrived at those offices, both were closed and locked. Both of the doors had notes on them that indicated that the occupants were out and would be back later. One, an hour later, the other, two hours later.
There were comfortable chairs there, and a cafeteria down the hall and I could have just waited, or gone and eaten. For a brief moment, I even pondered the possibility of leaving and returning in an hour, after running a much needed errand. Then I realized that returning in an hour would mean having to try once again to find a vacant parking space and there was no way I was going to deal with that nightmare again anytime soon, let alone again on that day.
So I wrote down the phone numbers of the people I was there to see and decided that I would try to get them on the phone and get my questions answered that way, even though it may take weeks to finally get through.
Then I walked back to my car. Of course, someone circling in the lot saw me emerge from the building and followed me back to my car. In fact, two different cars followed me back to my own vehicle, from two different directions. As I got into my car, the two drivers sat there, glaring at each other. Both were waiting to see which way I would back out, each waiting for the slightest opening to race forward into the newly vacant parking spot and cut the other off in doing so.
Not wanting to witness a parking lot accident, I backed out slowly and deliberately, blocking one of the two cars from moving forward into the now open space. Maybe I was unfair and should have just let the two of them fight it out. But I had seen enough fighting among veterans for one day. So, for that one brief moment, I forced peace into the parking lot wars. Then, mission accomplished, I headed home.
posted by me at 8:23 PM
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