Parallel Parking Phobia

I’m moving to Chicago from a small town in Michigan in about twenty days.

And I cannot parallel park.

I did learn to parallel park during driver’s ed, and I was actually quite good at it. When others didn’t turn the wheel quite hard enough to the left, I’d crank it with all my might. While others hesitated just a fraction of a second too long before jerking the wheel in the other direction, I, er, jerked it with confidence.

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But that was fourteen years and four kids ago. Plus, back when I learned how to do it, I was driving a Volkswagen Golf. You don’t even really have to “parallel” park those things—you can just point your car in the general direction of the parking space and slide right in. And since then I’ve always had my own driveway or garage or spacious parking lot and plentiful, large downtown parking places, leaving parking muscles atrophied.

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I admit that even with the easy parking I’ve enjoyed over the last few years—huge spaces marked by thick white lines—I’ve taken the easy route many times, driving around the block until I find a couple of spaces close together to give me more navigating room, or parking around the corner on a residential street and walking further in order to avoid the sweaty-faced panic I’d feel while trying to park the car into a single vacant space as cars either pile up behind me waiting or squeeze around me. I always imagine that people are laughing at me, or pointing at me as they drive by: “Learn to parallel park, loser!”

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In a small town, you can get away with never parallel parking without too much inconvenience at all. But in the city, I’m finding, not so much. I found this out the hard way during my last trip to our new apartment, where my husband has been living for two months. Our new neighborhood in West Rogers Park isn’t very congested in general, but by 6 PM most evenings the curb is pretty full, with just a handful of spaces available. Worse, I no longer drive a teeny little easy-parker, but a kid-hauling minivan, which apparently was not made with sharp turns in mind. And to make matters worse, in my most self-conscious moments I imagine all the neighbors to be much more cosmopolitan than I, and also lacking in anything better to do than mock me as I try and fail and try and fail and finally, drive away in defeat.

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At my worst moments I imagine that the new neighbors are watching me from the many windows along my street: laughing as I sidle up to a parking place and size it up, elbowing each other as I give the giving the steering wheel a crank and start trying to back in; hooting as I realize I’m not coming it at even close to the right angle, then shaking their heads at me as I give up and drive away. The humiliation is complete as I walk the two blocks with four kids and ten grocery bags in tow, passing several vacant spaces along the way. Okay, so it's likely that my neighbors all have lives and much better things to do than make fun of me. But not my kids.

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“Why didn’t we park there, Mom?” asks my oldest son, Jacob.

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“Or there?” pipes up Isaac.

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“Or ova thew?” lisps my three-year-old, William.

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“Gah!” complains Owen, the baby.

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Of course, I’d rather walk the two blocks and pinch a nerve in my shoulder from the heavy load than repeat the first time I “successfully” parallel parked in front of our new home—with one of my wheels up on the curb in front of an impeccably-landscaped yard (hey, I saw another guy do it! I thought everyone did it! I didn’t KNOW!)

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The next day when I came out to my car, it was covered with signs reading “PARK IN THE STREET, NOT ON MY PROPERTY” and I was forced to yank off this scarlet “A”—or make that “BP” (for “bad parker”) in front of what suddenly seemed like dozens of passersby.

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So tell me, Chicago moms. Am I the only one, or are there long-time city-dwellers who are also parallel-parking deficient? Can one re-learn to parallel park? Is there a place in the city where I can take training courses? Is it physically possible to parallel park a minivan? Or should I just resign myself to long walks, pinched nerves, and jeers from my kids?

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Please tell me there's hope. And if there's not, and you notice me one day in my minivan, trying to back into a space, hitting the curb, sweating and flustered, and then finally just driving away--please, please, pretend you didn't see me.

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Meagan also blogs at Equilibrium