Looks are deceptive
I go to pick my son up every day from school. There is no dedicated parking space for us and so we park our cars alongside the road in a straight line without obstructing traffic. On our left is the school building and outside its boundaries is a space where the teachers and staff park their cars perpendicular to ours.
One day, a lady who had parked her car in the staffs’ space asked me to move my parked car. Just in front of my car was a doctor colleague’s car whom I knew well.
This lady lectured me at length on how I have parked my car in a space which should not have been done. Roads are not meant for parking and blah blah ….
Thinking that she must be a school teacher, I ran like an obedient student to call the doctor colleague to move his car. Only when he moved his car, could I move mine. He came running as briskly as me and shifted his car. I shifted mine and the lady removed her car grandly as we both looked on .
I felt the same as I used to feel when I got a scolding from my teacher !
I was feeling embarrassed as I must have “ fallen from grace” for not following civic rules.
I felt like a school child who had got whacked for not doing the home work.
Anyways ,the keen observer that I am, I had noted her car’s model and number so that in future I stay clearly away from her.
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The next day, as I reached school in the afternoon, I saw her car well parked in the same space.
I took extra care to park well in front but I could clearly see it from my rear view mirror.
In a few minutes, I saw the same lady coming in a cycle rickshaw with a kid and getting down to reach her parked car !!
God!! That means she was not any teacher….and moreover that kid was not even from this school.
By this time , a cab had already parked behind my car blocking her car.
I waited, this time with some excitement and a devilish thought of seeing her reaction now with a cab driver !!
She was quiet and didn’t utter a word. It took another half an hour for that cab to clear space and she sat there patiently not daring to lock horns with a cabbie !