It’s been an odd couple of days, with an almost supernatural undercurrent of awkwardness, permeating my encounters and making a tricky time seem so much harder.
Yesterday, for the first time, I used my car’s horn in anger. Why? Because traffic coming from the other direction, turning right, was queueing on the mini roundabout meaning that I couldn’t cross over to continue my journey. So when the traffic moved on by one car length, and the next inconsiderate driver moved onto the mini roundabout to block my path, I beeped at them. This is a rare reaction for me, but there had already been various other inconsiderate drivers and pedestrians on my route, so I was already cooking. Fortunately this was only a minor inconvenience and I went about the rest of my day.
Work was a little stressful, with a higher than usual number of things being pushed onto my stack, and the ones I was already working on providing political inconveniences.
The evening was calmer; pancake practice was less smooth than I’d have liked, but once I got into the swing of it was feeling much better. An unexpected but welcome visit from a jet-lagged friend, with an expected gift of pop-tart flavours otherwise unavailable, rounded off my day with an improved smoothness.
Which brings me to this morning. I needed to make a trip to the local sorting office to collect a parcel. I pulled into an available space, thinking nothing of it, and headed to the door. Two people were already waiting, but 15 minutes after it was supposed to open there was no sign of life. During this period I noticed someone else pull into the car park and block me in. I wasn’t too worried as I figured they’d be reasonable.
A few minutes later and someone arrived to start processing the queue of people. Great, the day has started moving forward. I collect my package and return to my car. I’d seen where the driver had gone and went to ask them to let me out.
Except they’d gone through a staff entrance, with no way of calling them.
Bemused, I went back to the front desk to politely ask the man behind the counter to find the driver. But the man behind the counter insists he now can’t do anything, because he has to man the counter. I’m now approaching righteous indignation. As I return to the staff door I notice the driver lurking, and I approach. This man is not apologetic for blocking me in, informing me instead that I have parked in the staff parking area (which is not delineated from the customer parking) and stating that Royal Mail have been notified about the lack of signage. But he grudgingly moves his car and I go about my day.
Being in the right doesn’t mean you’re allowed be inconsiderate! I had perfectly good reason to believe I was allowed to park there. First blocking me in and then being mopey about it was not the correct approach to his parking issues.
But I am a believer in blogging with purpose, so the point of my rant? An act of kindness, performed for me this morning, meant the world to me, and my outlook is much brighter now.
Sometimes life is hard; being inconsiderate can make someone’s bad day worse, while an act of kindness can do the opposite. I don’t consider myself especially inconsiderate, but I do want to take more opportunities to be kind, to others and to myself.
