Right out of high school I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do, and the Patriots already had a quarterback, so I went to community college. The first semester parking situation was like January 2nd at the gym if the 2nd was Black Friday and the parking lot was at Walmart. The purchase of a $20 campus parking pass, like $50,000 today or 4 pieces of plywood, was mandatory.
Day 1 - I arrived at 8:40am and those with 8am classes got all of the good spaces. I circled campus and I was wrong; they got all of the spaces.
I drove to the edge of campus, which was in a different zip code, and I left my car on the grass. I had a can of white spray paint in the trunk from, well I was 18 and just from. I painted parking space lines on the grass to make it official.
After classes, there was a ticket on my windshield. Apparently the parking space I created on the grass wasn’t convincing enough.
I went to the student center and argued my case with the campus police. “You sold more parking passes than you have spaces which is illegal.” And I pounded my fist on the files stacked on the counter. Since I was an 18 year old freshman at community college, the cop was probably certain I wasn’t a practicing attorney and my “I parked between the white lines” argument didn’t help. He was watching The People’s Court and likely fantasizing about being Rusty the bailiff; he motioned towards without taking his eye off the tv and spilled his coffee onto the floor. He got down on all fours to clean it up and I swept the files off the counter. The cop jumped up and banged the back of his head on the underside of the desk. He peeked over the edge of the desk gave me an angry look. I said, “wind.”
These campus police were real cops like I was a gen-u-ine superhero by wearing Batman pajamas and sitting on the couch waiting for a crime in my living room. The ‘cop’ suggested I wait in the lot for someone to leave but that would have made me late for class.
Day 2 - I parked in my Day 1 'spot' next to a Firebird which had a ticket already on the windshield. I took their ticket and put it under my wiper. When I came out after classes, the Firebird had another ticket and I put their original ticket next to it. I reasoned that they can’t get two tickets for one offense; and he was driving a Firebird so he was probably a toolbox. He deserved two tickets.
Day 3 - I parked on the grass and I had to break out the paint again as someone was in my spot. I folded a piece of yellow notebook paper longways, and put that under my wiper. No ticket that day.
Day 4 - I was getting a bit bolder and Judge Wapner was in reruns, so I felt was like jumping off a cliff with no jump and less cliff. My last class was on the first floor, so I parked right outside the classroom window. And I used the same yellow piece of paper and spray paint from Day 3.
After class, I, quite literally, climbed out the window and jumped in my car, like Batman if Batman used the driver’s side door and drove a Fiero. My friends followed suit began parking next to me on the grass, and we had a row of spaces with our names spray painted on them. The campus police had to either hand out a lot of tickets and miss The People’s Court , or tune in to find out if Wapner would award the wronged tenant their security deposit.
In the end, I got my parking fees refunded, my parking ticket was torn up, and it took me years of Halloweens to use the case of white spray paint I purchased on Day 3. I made my own parking pass for the half-empty faculty parking lot which was much closer than student parking. Wapner refunded the security deposit, and every time I walked past the campus police counter, a random gust of wind would blow the stacked files onto the floor.
