tow

The Berkeley Police are good at getting their car.

Yesterday Kent went to hop in his car and toodle off to work. Only there was a blockage. Someone had parked across the driveway. Every so often someone does this.

We always wonder what's going on with them. It's pretty easy to tell you've parked across a driveway. The red paint on the curb is worn murky. And the curb is kinda low anyway. But the weeds are getting high in the dirt strip between the sidewalk and the curb so it's obvious when the weeds stop and the driveway begins. I mean, it's obvious to us. Must be obvious to most people because impacted as parking gets around here there's seldom a car parked across the driveway.

Then there's yesterday morning. Kent came in, "Where's the police number?" Groggily, still abed, I said, "Look in the phone book." Kent found the nonemergency number, dialed, read the dispatcher the car's make and license.

This was 8:15 or 8:30. By 9 the towtruck was rumbling away with its prey. Unless you're in a big hurry a half hour to 45 minutes isn't a traumatic inconvenience. The police officers are always friendly, though calling a tow truck must seem kind of a dumb duty. And the towtruck operators are efficient and courteous. I suppose the city gets a bit of change off the business.

When last I came home to find a car parked across the drive I was walking and Kent hadn't yet driven in. I made the call and the process took about 30-40 minutes. It's a good service. When Kent got home that evening I told him, "Ten minutes earlier and you wouldn't have been able to get in the driveway."

I remember Mom would get irked by people parking across her drive. I don't remember her calling the police to have any cars removed. But I do remember on Apple Blossom weekend in Sebastopol parking would get bad so Mom would haul sawhorses out to the curb and set them up in front of the drive, red rags hanging off them, and a NO PARKING sign. Nobody ever moved the sawhorses in order to park there.

Back to yesterday. Kent is gone. It's 9:20. I'm lying in bed. Still feeling groggy from a thrashy sort of night (man, this bug I caught has been a bear) and I hear a heavy knocking on the front door. I lie there wondering about getting up to answer. Voices. Can't make out them out, 'cept for something about "parking" ... Uh huh. Parking. Pound pound pound goes the caller. I lie there in the dim room trying to think what getting involved in this story would do for me. Would I offer them use of our phone to call the towing company? If my car had disappeared I figure I'd call the police. "My car is missing!" They'd happily tell me, as Kent says, "the good guys got it." There's a grocery store a two minute walk from here; there are pay phones there. But doesn't everybody have a cell phone these days?

And would they be upset, would they want to tell me their story? Would they be upset with me? What's with the angry pounding? I didn't get up. They went away.

Sure, once in awhile you make a dumb mistake. It was obvious you shouldn't have. But you did. Didn't stop Kent & me from musing over it last night. When did they realize they'd parked in a driveway? When they got back and their car was missing? Oh. Look. A driveway. When we were parked there we couldn't see it.

Each time I think yeah they knew but they were in a hurry. Park there two minutes, ten tops, rush to the store or to the friend's house and be right back. Surely I couldn't be so unlucky as to have my car towed in that time. The car yesterday was sitting there at least an hour before the owners returned.

We used to think, you know, if they left a note on their dashboard what house they were visiting we could go roust 'em to move their damn car. They'd get an earful but save the impound lot charges. But then we discovered how efficient the city towing service is.