This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
So there was a parking ticket waiting for me on my windshield when I walked out of a restaurant in downtown Salt Lake City the other day.
OK, it's not as if I haven't had this experience before. I used to collect parking tickets the way brown polyester pants (the ones I wore when I worked at Taco Time, for example) collect lint. But then one day I realized I was sick of being an idiot, so I started following proper parking etiquette, which includes a) parking where you're supposed to and b) feeding the meter enough money to pay for the privilege of parking where you're supposed to.
I know! I'm such a grownup now!
Which is why I was shocked — shocked! — to see that ticket flapping in the breeze on my windshield. According to my watch, I still had plenty of time left. Also, I had taken extra care to pay for the correct parking space, which is challenging because I often forget my parking space number by the time I get to those stupid Pay Stations. Unless, of course, I write the number on my hand. WHICH I HAD.
(Author's note: One of the advantages of writing things on your hands is that hands, unlike random scraps of paper, are hard to lose.)
Anyway, when I saw that ticket, the steam just came rolling out of my ears. I was all WHAT?! I finally play by the Parking Rules and this is what I get?! A ticket for $25?
So, I decided to drive straight to the City & County Building right then and there to throw down with the Parking Powers That Be. On my way over, I imagined how things would go when I went mano a mano with the City. I would call the City a name. And then the City would call me a name. And then I would say I'm rubber, you're glue, whatever you say bounces off of me and sticks to you. And then the City would arrest me. And then I would say I was happy to go to the clink (aka the Big House, the cooler, the slammer, the black hole, the joint) if it meant I didn't have to pay that stupid $25 ticket, which I did NOT deserve to get in the first place.
In other words, I planned on making a big old scene.
But by the time I arrived at the City & County Building, I decided to be more restrained in my approach, even though I was still furious — probably because I myself have been on the receiving end of an unhappy customer's tirade, which makes you feel like crap, especially if you're also required to wear a pair of lint-collecting brown polyester pants on the job.
So, with a great deal of effort, I settled on being polite and reasonable instead. And guess what. The clerk was polite and reasonable right back to me, especially when he discovered that I had been given that ticket by mistake. Oh, snap.
Why am I telling you this story?
Because I had a significant birthday this spring and I've been thinking about all the stuff I know now that I didn't know when I was younger — and one of those things is this: My first impulse is rarely my best impulse. Which is why — now that I'm old — I occasionally try to go with the second impulse. Unless, of course, someone cuts me off.
Do. Not. Cut. Me. Off.
(I'm serious.)