Street Cleaning: The Devil's Dance

7:08 AM – You wake up. It feels like a beautiful New York City morning. Your mood is bright and you’re full of optimism.

7:09 – You remember there’s street cleaning and you have to move your car. Mood sinks accordingly. World now a dark, unwelcoming place.

7:37 – Freshly showered, you sit down (see: stand over sink) and eat breakfast (see: hard-boiled egg and hot sauce). You plan out the impending hour-and-a-half you must spend in the car while street is allegedly “cleaned.” 

7:43 – Forget you have to move the car for street cleaning.

8:26 – Re-remember you have to move the car for street cleaning. 

8:34 – Arrive breathless at car four minutes late. No ticket. You’re somehow both thankful and bitter.

8:35 – Scan the scene. Some familiar faces, some new ones. There’s the man with the Kia who never brushes his hair. There’s the woman with the Honda hatchback who always looks angry. And there’s the Ford Fiesta with ol’ Lenny (name you randomly gave him). All are muddled faces behind windshields. All stubborn city car owners like you, out here, doing the devil’s dance.

8:37 – You double-park your car along with everyone else. You toggle with the seat recliner to attain optimal angle for doing jack shit.

8:41 – Instagram binge.

8:47 – Check your side-view mirror for any sign of the street sweeper. Look for the barely perceptible aura of soot that haloes around it. Nothing there. But it’s early. Sigh, it’s so, so early.

8:51– Lift your head from phone to peek in the rear-view at driver behind you. Not for too long, they might notice. You then freak out at how often the driver in front might have looked at you through their rear-view. Recall the disgusting things you may have done to your face in the previous few minutes.

8:53 – Start of nine straight minutes of phone. Just phone. 

9:02 – Seethe with anger over reading something that offends you as a [insert political affiliation]. Damn those good-for-nothing [insert opposing political affiliation]! Damn them! You hate them all!

9:03 – Look in side-view mirror. No street sweeper.

9:03 – Look in side-view mirror. No street sweeper.

9:03 – Look in side-view mirror. No street sweeper.

9:04 – Look into other side-view mirror, for no logical reason.

9:07 – Instagram binge.

9:09 – You zone out into the middle distance. All things blur except for a misfit brown leaf on a sun-kissed tree. You are rapt. Poor misfit. Poor, adorable little misfit leaf. You want to take the leaf home now, care for it, teach it compassion, tolerance and altruism. Little leaf. You’re going to name it Arnold.

9:12 – A honked horn startles you out of your extended daydream about Arnold the Leaf. You look in the side-view with hope… but it’s just an Amazon Prime van trying to get past. You pull in side-view mirror as your soul dies a little.

9:14 – Bite off a hangnail. 

9:17 – Look in side-view mirror for the street sweeper. Nothing. Of course, nothing–But, wait! Is that… could it be… No, it’s just a stupid God’s Love We Deliver truck. Thanks for nothing, God’s Love We Deliver!

9:20 – Start to wonder if it’s too early/illegal to order liquor to your car.  

9:41 – Check for the street sweeper. No sign. Instead you see a driver get out of their double-parked car and run inside. Who does he think he is? Just up and leaves his car there unattended. The arrogance. You hope he gets a ticket. You hope the street sweeper comes and he’s left without a spot when everyone pulls back in. You hope he pays for his hubris. There are rules here. Unwritten rules we abide by, to function as a collective. And one selfish, short-sighted individual cannot subvert the machinations of society at their own–oh, wait, he’s back now. Looks like he grabbed a Vitamin Water.  

9:45 – You’re not 100% sure if you’ve been talking aloud last few minutes or just thinking super hard.

9:52 – The Big Back-And-Forth begins. Do you just pull in and leave now, eight minutes before the finish line, in sight of the mountaintop? You’ve heard many tales of how tickets have been given in these desperate final moments, when the siren call of doing-anything-but-this becomes too much for some to resist. But you will not cave. You will not break. You will not be weak, like them. You have the iron will of an iron lion. You are strong! You are stronger! 

9:53 – Pull muscle adjusting air conditioner.   

9:58 – As the assembled group of drivers (“parkers,” in this instance?) realizes the street sweeper isn’t coming and this sacrificed morning was all for nothing, you join the jaded herd and reclaim your previous spot. You still feel good, in a way. At least it’s another seven glorious days free of car parking worries… Until you remember you promised to pick up your stepmother from JFK later that night. 

10:01 – Slash own tires, smear car oil across your mouth, and run down the street laughing madly.