what I’m learning

Life’s a parking lot and then you die.
If it isn’t some idiot taking driving lessons
on his cell phone who cuts you off
or drives into the space you’re waiting for,
then it’s some old guy taking a nap
behind you in his idling SUV while you’re
trying to back out. I could go on.

There are polite people in parking lots
so social theorists say. I am sure
that the guy who originally painted
the lines to mark the spaces thought so,
because he didn’t leave enough room
for anybody but a grass snake
to exit without scratching the paint
on the heirloom limousine beside me.

Ideally, when I enter a mall parking lot,
I will find a drive-through space
so that I can leave it moving forward.
My experience exiting in reverse
has been that someone else will
back into my path after I look behind
but before I start reversing.

My grandson understands irony.
He gets that it’s a reverse idea.
By that logic, cell phones, old
guys in SUVs, parking lot planners, and
the whole parking lot experience is
ironical. But that’s life.