PARKING RIGAMAROLE

Read on to learn how my car cup holders relates to parking.

Day One, Monday, 8/26/19

I have a new respect for people who have degrees from the University of Memphis. They are, I think, gifted geniuses. It doesn’t matter if they scored high on their SAT exams or whether they graduated magna cum laude. I am extrapolating that, if they have a degree from the U of M, they attended at least a few classes, and that therefore, if they did attend classes, they successfully navigated the U of M parking situation.

I recently enrolled as an “elite” (senior citizen) student to audit a class. Despite my advanced age, I thought I was up to it. I sent in the registration form with the $25 fee, but then I heard nothing back. After many emails, to which I got no response; phone calls, which were never answered; and leaving many voice mail messages, which were never returned, I finally got an email saying I had been successfully registered and asking for my “U#”. I emailed back that I didn’t have a “U#”. Response was that it had been sent to my U of M email. I responded that I didn’t have a U of M email. Their response: Use your “U#” to look it up. I began to sense a pattern.

I tried a work around. I looked up the class in the online catalogue and found out what building it was in and the days and times it was held (Tuesday and Thursday mornings at 9:40). I downloaded a tiny print campus map. With a magnifying glass, I found the building and the closest parking lot.

I live 10 minutes from campus. Map and magnifying glass in hand, I drove over there a few days before school started, located my building and the parking lot – great, it was right across the street from the building. (Due to my asthma, coupled with the continuing summer heat, and a bad back, I knew I couldn’t walk from a far parking lot to class.)

The email had said I had been mailed a precious parking pass (PPP). I did not receive it. Read online that if I didn’t get my PPP by the first day of classes, I could go to the Parking Office to get it. I had, many decades earlier, successfully passed my driver’s exam which included parallel parking. But this

proved to be a much bigger challenge than that had been.

On the first Monday of classes, I located the Parking Office and the adjacent Visitor ($3 per hour) parking garage on the tiny print map. I drove over, punched the button for a card with which to pay and the gate lifted. I found a spot and parked, marched confidently into the office and stood in line. A line worker asked what I needed; I told her I was a new elite student and had not received my PPP. She asked for the dreaded “U#.” Uh, don’t have one. Student ID? Also no. (You need a U# to get a Student ID). Hmmmm. She told the clerk behind the desk. The clerk repeated the same questions to me.

But, there was also a clever woman sitting there: she used her handy computer and armed with only my name, was able to look up my elusive U#!!! Using that, she found an envelope, right there in a box on her desk, with my actual name on it and my PPP within!!! I was overjoyed – we hugged tenderly and exchanged addresses for Christmas cards.

Putting my PPP safely in my purse, I headed happily to my car, no longer bitter about having to pay the $3 parking fee this one time. Pulled up to the lift gate, tried to insert my card multiple ways, but the machine wouldn’t take it. An employee came out and also tried. No luck. My joy was fading. But, the employee cleverly put his very own ID in the machine and the gate lifted. I felt a little better, plus I didn’t even have to pay the $3. Life was good.

I drove around the campus to the parking lot I had staked out across from my class building, which was also next to the Admissions Building where I was hopeful I might attain a student ID and access to my U of M email. I pulled saucily up to the gate, my PPP hanging from the rearview mirror as instructed. Ha! I’ve got this thing handled, I thought. I could see the camera poised to photograph my PPP and thus lift the gate. But nothing happened. I nudged my PPP to a different position. I held it up closer to the camera. (Maybe my 21 year old car has an oddly placed rearview mirror?) No go.

Well, that camera or gate may be broken. I backed up & pulled up to a different gate. Nothing.

In desperation, I called the help number on the post. Why wasn’t my beautiful new PPP working?

The helpful guy on the phone told me it was because I did not have a PRIORITY PARKING PASS and the tantalizingly close lot I was trying to access was a PRIORITY lot. (I guess he could really see me and my inadequate PPP in the camera the whole time, and was laughing wildly at my distress.) I asked how to get a PRIORITY pass. “Go to the Parking Office he said. It’s $99 a semester. But they’re sold out for this semester.” At least he had the decency to save me another trip there.

Dejectedly, I pulled out. How to get to the Admin Building? There were a bunch of cars, maybe a couple of hundred, parked along the street around the corner. The sign said “No Parking. Violators will be towed.” However, there was one “Violator” spot left and I figured they’d have to tow the other 200 cars before they got to me. So I took my chances, made a U-turn, and squeezed into an illegal spot.

I headed over to the Admin Building. By this time, my confidence was gone and I was pretty hot and tired and sweaty. Oddly for the first day of classes, most of the offices appeared unoccupied. In the fourth office, I finally found another clever woman who took pity on me. She explained that to get into my email, I had to get a secret 20 digit verification code in order to “initialize my account.” She generously, and probably with risk of termination, gave me the code and showed me to a nearby computer, where she graciously pulled up the U of M site and again, using my handy U# (How did I ever function without one?) AND my proper U of M email address, which she also divulged, showed me where to stick my 20 digit verification number. Saints and angels be praised! I had made it into the system!

By this time I was pretty cocky and downright giddy with success. After only one or two tries, I found the station where they took the ID pictures. U#? Check. User name? Check. And low and behold, the young man quickly took a terrible photo of me, put it on a card for all to see, and handed me my ID card. I had done it! I felt ready to graduate, but first I needed to go home and take a nap, and maybe have a stiff drink.

Sadly, though, I still had to figure out how to get from the far parking lot to class without passing out.

I had seen an intriguing sign in the Parking Office about the “Blue Line” – an on-campus shuttle. So, I came home, and before my nap, pulled up the U of M website, Parking Division. There they explained the niceties of the Blue Line – it made quite a circuit around campus, and you could download an app so that you could see the little bus making its way around campus on your phone. So I downloaded the app. Ha! I thought again. I have conquered this system. I will go to campus, park in a Non-Priority lot in a distant land, and just wait for the handy shuttle to take me effortlessly to my class.

I am sooooo gullible.

Day Two, Tuesday, 8/27/19

Finally, the first day of class arrived. Though only 10 minutes from campus by car, not including parking, I decided to leave at 8:40, allowing myself an hour to get from the distant lot to my class.

I woke up bright and early at 8am – not my strong suit. I fed and medicated my two dogs, and medicated myself – I can’t eat that early, but I had a Frappuccino. I put a bottle of water, a notebook with all my U-numbers, passwords, verification codes, etc . printed in it, the tiny print map, and my phone in my purse. Gave the dogs their after breakfast treats, filled their water bowls. I was running 20 minutes later than planned, but I still had 40 minutes to get to class - it’s just not easy for me to get going early.

Drove merrily over to the biggest non-Priority lot with my PPP dangling sportily from the rear view mirror. Drove around and around the lot. There were no vacant spaces. Time was running short. I spotted a vacant visitor space with a meter. I couldn’t read what the meter said in the glare of the sun, so I just put my credit card in, punched the button several times to add time, and rushed over to the shuttle stop. I waited… and waited. It was too bright to read the app on my phone to see where the shuttle was. By 10 am, no shuttle had come. Was too late to go to class now. All shreds of confidence had evaporated with the heat.

I got in the car, knocking my PPP off the rear view mirror when I removed my windshield sunscreens. I thought, well, better put it in a safe spot so I don’t lose it, even though it’s pretty useless in terms of parking. So I carefully placed it on the cup holder that pulls out from the front of the car, behind my big water cup. Once at home, I picked up my water cup, but I accidentally nudged my PPP. I watched helplessly as my hard-won PPP slid silently into the slot above the cup holder and vanished into the innards of my car!

You’d think this would be the last straw, but I am hard-headed. I went in the house and got a large knife and some tweezers. I put the knife in the slot, thinking to fish out the PPP and grab it with the tweezers. But I could feel a void a short way in – obviously the car had eaten my PPP.

I was done in. I took the nap, not the drink – it was only 10:30 am. Feeling a little better after a 2 hour nap and lunch, I studied the situation again. Should I just give up and try to enroll in an online course? But they cost a couple of hundred dollars that I didn’t have, and I really wanted a live class for the interaction.

I looked up the number for the Parking Office again. Something caught my eye – how to apply for a handicapped parking tag. I called the Parking Office and inquired about a handicapped tag and a replacement PPP. They said I’d need to get a form from my doctor to send in for the state tag, but in the meantime, I could go to the Parking Office (now my favorite hangout) and get a replacement PPP for $10 and a temporary handicapped tag until I got the state tag. Here’s the great thing: with a handicapped tag and my replacement PPP, I wouldn’t be limited to the Handicapped Parking Spaces.

I could park anywhere on campus, even in the Priority Parking Lots!

Day 3, Wednesday, 8/28/19:

Once again, off I went to my hangout, the Parking Office. I was on top of things today: I had my U#, and my ID with the terrible picture. I forked these over along with $10, and I got another PPP and a temporary Handicap Tag, which I placed carefully on the passenger seat, not the cupholder.

I feel bad about getting a Handicap Tag, because I have friends and relatives that have to use a wheelchair, a walker or a cane, and I do know how difficult it is for them to get around and how unfair it is when an able bodied person is taking up a handicap spot. I would never do that, and don’t intend to park in a handicap space. When I pulled up to the gate at my preferred Priority Parking Lot for a test run, the gate lifted like magic and there were plenty of places in the lot. At 69, unfortunately, I really cannot physically walk from one of the far lots to my class, without a lot of stops to rest. Plus, there weren’t any places in the far lot anyway, and the shuttle apparently is not very reliable, nor is the availability of visitor spaces.

So I look on this as a last-ditch, desperate work around to get to my class by figuring out how to park in a Priority lot, for which the passes are sold out, but spaces are indeed available.

Day 4, Thursday, 8/29/19:

Resisted the urge to watch another hour of TV last night to chill out, and went to bed early, for me, at 1AM. Set my alarm for 7AM; got up at 7:45. Fed and medicated and fed the dogs. Took my meds, drank a Frappuccino. Loaded up my purse and treated the dogs. Wanted to allow an hour to get to class, but of course, actually left my house 10 minutes late, at 8:50. Put my PPP and temporary handicap tag on the rearview mirror; drove to campus; pulled up to the gate in the Priority lot across from my building. Slick as ice, the gate lifted and I headed into the lot. The array of empty spaces was overwhelming. I chose one in the shade, nearest the street.

I crossed the street and was in the building in mere minutes, 30 minutes early for class! Incredible.

I scoped out where the class was, located the restrooms, and contemplated treating myself to a 2nd Frappucino at the concession stand. But, they were $3.29, and even though I’d saved $3 on parking on Day One, I resisted. I did have my bottle of water.

I attended the class, but it was pretty anti-climactic. I feel like I’ve already achieved so much, and have passed the hardest test, so I don’t know if it’s really necessary to keep going to class. I may keep going, just for the hell of it, as it’s bound to be a breeze compared to figuring out the parking puzzle.