Alarming

Parking in Long Beach is almost non-existent, unless your house has a driveway or or your apartment comes with parking beneath the building. Ours comes with a garage (for which we pay extra every month and wind up using for storage because of its narrowness) and a single parking space.

I used to park in the single space directly behind our apartment building until shortly after my car accident almost two years ago. For a week, I parked my new car in that space, and within that time, my neighbor managed to damage the bumper not once, but twice as he attempted to back in/pull out of his space directly behind mine. So I stopped parking back there. CM wouldn't park in the space, either, so we offered it to our other neighbor, warning her about the damage inflicted to my car. She happily took the spot, and I began nightly hunts for spaces to park, eventually giving up altogether and leaving my car roughly six blocks away in an area known as Carroll Park. (Many homes in that area are older, historic homes complete with city plaques. The winding street is narrow with room for only three cars: two parked on either side of the street with a just-larger-than-car-width lane in between. Most of the homes also come with long driveways so non-neighborhood cars find easy parking along Carroll Park.) Out of habit, I steered toward Carroll Park each night for almost two years.

Then, a little over a week ago, I accidentally set off my car's alarm while clearing condensation from the windows. I caught the honking in enough time, allowing only two honks to escape, but that appeared to be enough for one Carroll Park resident. And tall man, probably in his early fifties, wearing a faded t-shirt and shorts the khaki color of his flip-flops, brisly walked toward me from his house.

"A-ha!" he said. "I recognized that honk." I said good morning. "You know, your car alarm has been going off every morning around 3 or 4 for the past few years. By the time I get up to look, there aren't any other cars around. One time, my neighbor and I were sitting on his porch around 8, and the alarm just went off while we watched." I grunted to let him know I was listening, if not focusing too much. My mind was elsewhere, trying to deal with the layoffs we had a few days earlier, trying to convince myself that even though my throat was a bit scratchy that I was not coming down with a cold. "For a month there, we didn't hear it at all and thought you'd finally moved away." I grunted again. "You should really get that checked. Well, good morning to you." He headed back to his house, and I shuffled into the car and drove to work.

It dawned on me as I coasted along the 405 South, a few years and no note on my windshield? I would think a normal person would do something like that, especially if he was sure it was my car. And no one contacted the police? By the time I reached worked, I decided to call CM to ask about switching parking spaces for a while so I could discover if, in fact, the alarm sounded on its own.

That night, I slept very little, keeping an ear open for the loud honking of a horn. Around 6 AM I finally fell asleep. As far as I know, the alarm remained silent. I had warned our neighbor just in case, but she never heard it, either.

And now, more than a week has gone by, and so far, no sounds. Logic leads me to want to believe that he made a simple mistake. And yet, add in the fact that after a few years, no one left a note on my car -- and he was positive that alarm sounded from my car -- and no police notice, and I wonder if he just didn't want me to park in his neighborhood? With parking at a premium, who knows the truth.

But I am reluctant to park there now, even if I can't find anything closer to the apartment.