The other day, I was at the National Cowgirl Museum for a sidebar story dealing with the Ft. Worth Stock Show.

As I left, I had the theme from Blazing Saddles stuck in my head. I guess that sort of fits in with the museum, but I couldn’t figure out why, exactly, I’d started thinking of it.

Then I remembered an article that suggested a great way to get a song out of your head is to solve an anagram. It might be illegal to text and drive in some places, but it’s still perfectly legal to drive while you get out a pencil and rearrange the letters of “National Cowgirl Museum” to spell “Egomaniac tumor will sun.”

I spend a lot of time in the car. I drive around during the day going from story to story, but I also spend more than half my day working from the car, typing on my laptop and making phone calls.

People often look at my business card and say, “If your newsroom is at Victory Park, where do you office?” And I explain that I work out of my car. [Once, I was standing next to the car and said, “Right here,” and the other person exclaimed, “You actually get into the trunk?!” Ever since, I’ve been more careful about what part of the car I gesture toward when I’m standing next to it.]

As such, I take my time in the car very seriously, much like you might take seriously the time you spend in your fancy, ivory tower office.

For instance: I don’t like people milling about outside my office while I’m in the middle of a project, and I’ve recently noticed a spike in the number of times someone has parked right next to me.

I park strategically when I know I’ll be sitting there for a while. I usually choose a gas station or shopping center with a big lot and park clear from most of the other cars, usually near the street.

At the gas station, the rules of conduct are relaxed. A lot of contractors stop at the larger stations for lunch in the early afternoon. In those situations, we all park together off on the side of the building. We understand each other. We’re a community.

At the shopping center, though, there’s no reason to pull in next to me. I’m not talking about parking, getting out of your car and then going into the store. I’m talking about parking and then sitting there with the engine running, like you’re the getaway car. [FYI: if you are the getaway car, that’d be okay since you’ll only be there a few seconds, but you’d probably be more effective closer to the doors.]

There’s a whole parking lot there! Why not give yourself some privacy to make that phone call? Those contractors at the Quik-Trip down the street would love to have this much room to spread out!

I don’t know why it happens. Maybe you’re not the getaway car, but you did just drop someone off inside and are waiting for that person to come out. Maybe you see someone parked there and writing on a laptop, so you think that must be the electronic gadget section of the lot. Or maybe that lah-dee-dah brick-and-mortar office is cutting you off from the world and you feel lonely.

It doesn’t matter. There’s a code. And that code states that if you’re going to park in an empty section of the lot, you find a space that’s as far away from the next person as possible. If you’re feeling lonely, leave the lot entirely and go to a skating rink or something.

I follow the code meticulously. I had an interview in Mansfield the other day. I stopped for a sandwich and then pulled into a Kroger lot to start working. I found the perfect spot: on the side of the store, almost around the back. A tree provided shade. It faced only the loading dock.

But I spotted a pick-up truck. As I approached, I saw a guy inside with papers on his dashboard eating his own sandwich.

I’m sure he was terrified I was one of Those Guys who parks right next to him. Instead, though, we made brief eye contact and I moved to the opposite corner, closer to Broad Street.

There was no tree and more traffic. I was a little jealous, but the important thing is I ate that sandwich with dignity, which wouldn’t have been possible if I sat there alone in the restaurant like some child predator.

These have previously been the unwritten rules of the Working In Your Car Community. My hope is that by publishing
these guidelines to the masses, we might all learn from each other and, in turn, engender a more harmonious parking lot.