A few hours before the snowstorm the other week, there was a tight parking space in front of my house. I was hoping it would remain open as then there’d be a place to shovel the snow that we were expecting.

No such luck.

A grey car managed to wriggle its way into the space. Now that wouldn’t have been so bad except 1) it ended up with its wheels plopped on my curb, and 2) it was uncomfortably close to the rear of my neighbor’s car.

That’s two strikes already.

I couldn’t help wondering if the owner hadn’t heard the weather forecast. If we were to get nearly a foot of snow and it were to remain below freezing for well over a week, he was most likely going to be snowed in on this narrow street for some time to come.

As you know, we got the snow and the freezing temperatures.

Several days after most of us had cleared our sidewalks, I noticed the car’s owner had come to clear off his car—and he was doing so right onto my cleared sidewalk!

Strike three!

So I let him have it with a few choice words. He claimed he intended to clean it up, and he did clean it up and came back a few minutes later to salt my sidewalk to get rid of the lingering bits of snow that his shovel couldn’t remove.

OK, strike that last strike. Would he have cleaned up his mess if I hadn’t cursed at him? Who knows.

A few more days passed and I noticed that someone tried to move the car, as it was no longer tight against the snow in the front. Obviously the car didn’t get very far, because the space was so tight to begin with and with all that snow, there was just no room to get out.

A few more days passed and our street finally got cleared. I noticed my neighbor was shoveling out her car, so I went out to lend a hand. After we finished, I came back inside, and my neighbor decided to pull her car forward a couple feet to give the grey car a little room to maneuver, and she also shoveled a path from the sidewalk to the street.

The very next day I heard the low growling sound of a car out front, and when I went to check, I was just in time to see a young woman in the grey car managing to pull away and drive off. In the process she had not bothered to do any further shoveling and had completely obliterated the path that my neighbor had cleared the previous day.

Strike THREE!!!

I texted my neighbor, but she was aware of it, as she had spoken to the young woman who had rudely sassed her back.

So the two of us went back out to re-clear that path and try to fix the damage the young woman had done. She had dragged a fair amount of snow and ice back into the newly plowed street.

My neighbor was quite angry and said she couldn’t believe anyone would behave like that.

I was less surprised. I’ve come believe that there is a lot of bad in most people. I guess that makes me the anti-Anne Frank.