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This weekend everything went opposite of planned. Friday night Lauren and I went to dinner at a friend’s house. It was our first time over to their new place over on 15th Street just east of Peachtree in Ansley Park. We parked on the street in front of their place in a row of other cars. We had great time talking and eating and drinking and listening to music and finally left around 12:30. Upon leaving we could not find our car. Oddly all of the cars on the entire street were gone. We noticed a sign that said resident only parking 6PM-6AM. This is normally the time of day when all residents put their cars in their parking garages or in the driveways of their urban mansions. This neighborhood is very rich and has enough power to have people towed by the City of Atlanta from the public street. On top of that, they do not use the street for parking (there were NO cars on the street that night). Our friends gave us a ride home and told us to call them in the morning to get to where we needed.

Saturday I woke up feeling more sick than on Friday (when I had a sore throat). We could not get a hold of anyone to help us out so we hopped on the train to catch the 55 at 5 points. We missed our 9:30 by 2 minutes and waited another 40 among the homeless reading our magazine and book. We asked the bus driver if she knew Harriet street and she asked if we were going to A-tow. This operation is such a racket; they steal your car off the street and hold it ransom from you. Anyway we got the registration, found a ticket for $25, and got a phone call from Jon who came down and picked us up.

Then we were on our way to City Hall East. Only I had to make Jon pull over into the lot of an abandoned warehouse because I felt ill and had to yack. So Jon and Lauren were with me twice for the same meal from the night before. At the police property release office everyone has the same story. They had to catch cabs down to A-tow, back to City Hall East and then back to A-tow once they got the release. RACKET!!! We were nervous about the getting the release from the police because the car is not registered and we thought we had more fines in store for us. But it was released and we pulled out of A-tow at around noon.

Next we were off to meet the real estate agent to look at one last possible house before putting an offer on one we’d been talking about for awhile now. If all went as planned we’d be done in time to watch Michigan beat Ohio State. So much for plans. We found out that the place we liked was under contract as of the night before and, thus, we could no longer bid on it. Now we can only wait and see if the offer falls through. I won’t even get into the Michigan game and neither will you out of courtesy.

Sunday started off better but I was still reeling from the events of Saturday, and my performance on the soccer field suffered as a result.

I can only say that I am lucky that such a string of events only falls upon me occasionally and that there is a great deal to be learned which they do. Feeling vulnerable and helpless from time to time can be a great indicator of how prideful one can become just going through the motions. Facing conflict and surviving stripped me of some self-pride and reminded me about humility and for that I am grateful.