1/7 Spent half an hour shoveling out J’s car in front of her house so we could drive to the diner. The snow was about two feet high, all around the car, and for much of it I had to walk across the street with each shovel to empty it on the other side. When we got back from the diner, another car was parked in that spot. Technically legal, oh yes, it’s a public sidewalk, and yet, anyone can see that it’s the spot of whoever lives in that house. What a dick move. We fantasized how that car would get accidentally scratched by a key sticking out of someone’s bag, or somebody pouring hot water over the windshield to make it crack. As a more pedagogical approach, I was about to shovel a big heap of snow onto that car’s windshield.

We were lucky to realize our pettiness. It’s the stuff that sows animosity in a neighborhood forever. We could park across the street in the snow, using the downhill slope to help us get out of it if necessary. If we had been in need of a parking spot in a neighborhood that was fully snowed in, we would have done the same as that driver.