Finding Parking... or Love?

The city of Los Angeles is like dating. The actual layout, city planning, how to navigate it, is like dating or like how dating works. The traffic is the equivalent of how you end up dating a person. Maybe you met in a bar or maybe a grocery store (Bristol Farms has worked for me in the past)? And then of course there are the dating apps. But all in all, it’s the same thing. It’s traffic. It’s how you get there. Just like when you’re going somewhere in Los Angeles. From Bel Air to Silverlake, you can take the 405 (seriously?) to the 101 and just exit. Of course, you will want to account for the timing of your journey. Just like in dating. You could also not care about timing and take the scenic route. Taking Sunset the whole way, like if you feel that you’re not on a schedule to get there, at all, and you at least want the journey to be scenic, maybe even pleasurable.

We’ve heard that it’s about the journey and not about the destination. That’s all well and good when it comes to life in general or athlesure wear. When it comes to driving somewhere, it has to do with the journey, but it sure as hell has to be about the destination, as well. Same thing with dating, whether you met IRL or on an app; the swiping journey is fun, but ultimately it was always about the destination, unless you were someone who never played video games before and suddenly you understand the draw. So it’s about the destination, and what’s the first thing you do when you get to the destination? You park. Yes, traffic in Los Angeles is a sexy fifth circle of hell and Dante is your late Millennial barista, but parking? That’s at least the ninth circle of hell and Dante is your Gen x barista who doesn’t believe in drip. When it comes to both dating and traffic, who and what you end up with and where you park seems a lot more important.

So if you’re on your way to a first date and you have braved the traffic in a city that Dorothy Parker called “72 suburbs in search of a city,” and you’ve found the right glorified suburb, where do you park? If you’re like me and you like to meet people far away from your own house on the first and the second date, where to park is of utmost importance. I like to meet people far away from my home because I don’t want to be walked home on the first date and break a rib from a sudden, unannounced groping and having to rely on my already judgmental doorman to get me out of misplaced amour. Yes, it got biblical and we never spoke again, so now I meet people far, far away from my own habitat. I’m open to you picking the place of the date! I’m not offended if you pick somewhere with valet! Do it! I’m even happy to pay for valet! I like when you pay, but I’ll do it, no judgment, because I also like to be on time and not walk alone at night. I’ll do that in my own neighborhood, but I want you to feel that I can be a damsel and fear for my own life by walking because I value it, even if it’s always up to evaluation. Smiley face.

So, if it’s hard to park and you didn’t tell me, and you’re annoyed that I was late, I have to think that it’s going to be a difficult date and that it would be hard to park in the actual relationship. I have to wonder if it will be hard to find a middle ground and maybe you like testing me. But let’s say this be a leap year or something otherwise extraordinary and I felt a sudden, unaccustomed need to tell you that I was annoyed by the testing and didn’t feel any need to pass, just know that I will spend the next hour apologizing in a obviously-charming, self-effacing manner, which will then make you like me again, but then it’ll make me annoyed that I felt like I had to do that and now I don’t like this at all. This will hurt your feelings and make you realize that when you first saw my picture you thought “high maintenance,” but then you overcame yourself and remembered how blonde women need love too and have been so misunderstood throughout history—Marilyn, Fatal Attraction, Kelly Anne. But here I am, being mad about parking on a full moon after overcoming personal trauma with floor Pilates and I say fuck it, I’m guessing you’re testing my patience, my willingness to please and my shoes. And you say, yes, you fucking are and do I think you like having to test me and we both know I made you this way, right? I do, obviously, but because of someone else’s bad parallel parking.

Do you see? We are both such lovely people and now this! Because of parking! But as Dorothy Parker also said: “What fresh hell is this?” It’s dating. I don’t mind the driving. I mind the parking. But maybe dating and relationships are not a parking lot, at all? Maybe it’s a circus?