The Parking Lot and the Social Contract

​A funny thing happened to me as the calendar flipped from December of last year to January of this year: I lost my parking spot.
 
I should rephrase that: I didn’t lose “my” parking spot, because I don’t really have a parking spot. The spot I usually used didn’t have my name on it. I wasn’t assigned a numbered space and told, “you park in spot #47,” or anything like that. What I did have is a parking spot I chose in August of last year.
 
A certain degree of thought goes into choosing a parking spot. Some people like to be as close to their chosen building entrance as possible, and some people like to park far away to get their steps. Some like to park next to others they know, to facilitate conversation at the beginning or end of the shift. Others like to park with few cars around them, either for privacy or fear that another car door might open and nick their paint.
 
I compromised. I chose my spot in the second row, but furthest from the entrance (while I don’t believe I will lose 30 pounds that way, I am a person who could benefit from getting their steps). It ended up being far enough away that few parked right next to me, but in a row that is still relatively close to the building; because of the latter, I could walk out with a coworker or two if our schedules aligned. It seemed like a good place. I liked it. From August Inservice to Winter Break, I parked in the same place every day.
 
When school started up again on January 4, someone was in my parking spot.
 
I’m not going to mention names. But there are only about 3-4 people who get to work earlier than I do, so you can be sure I know exactly who took my parking spot. From August to Winter Break, this person parked at the very end of the front row, almost directly in front of me. I don’t know what happened, but on my first day back from Winter Break, they abandoned the front row and chose my spot in the second row.
 
And I’ll tell you, I was lost. I had come to depend on that parking spot. I always parked in that parking spot. So I felt a little miffed that I had been put out, but I also worried, as well; because I always had the same parking spot, I had never paid close attention to where everybody else parked. Now, I had to choose a new parking spot. Obviously, the person who took my parking spot didn’t concern themselves with whether or not someone would be put out, but I was very concerned, because I was going to have to park somewhere else and didn’t know if I would be taking someone else's spot.
 
I parked next to a buddy of mine in the back row, but I was almost certain I was taking someone else’s spot, and even if I wasn’t, I didn’t want to feel like a joiner. So the next day, I just sort of picked one at random, but it seemed too easy; if it was easy for me, it was almost certainly easy for someone else, and I imagined I was taking that someone's spot. So on a break during my second day of wayward parking, I looked out the window and examined the parking lot. There was an entire area that seemed vacant, the far end of the sixth and seventh rows; the next day, I took the last spot in the seventh row, and remained there for Thursday and Friday.
 
Somewhere in that stretch, my assistant principal caught me in the hall and pulled me into her office, saying she needed to talk to me. “Brehm, what’s up with the parking?” she asked. “I always park three down from you--why aren't you in your spot?”
 
That opened my eyes a bit. I wasn’t the only one affected by this; it turns out others had been thrown off, as well! Should I say something? Should I call out the person who took my spot and demand its return? I know it isn’t “mine,” but others had acknowledged it as such, and not just me!
 
I did nothing. One parking spot more or less doesn’t really make much of a difference. But it got me thinking. When it comes to parking, there’s a bit of a Social Contract in place. No one really set it in place, but it’s there. We choose our parking, and most of the rest of us come to accept our parking, and eventually we tacitly agree, this is how we will park. For the good of the group and to keep a certain order within this tiny subset of society, we come together to observe these “rules.”
 
Well. Some of us do.
 
Please understand: this post is not designed to lash out at the person who now parks where I used to park, it's designed to show a certain manner of thinking. When I was displaced, I agonized about not upsetting someone else, but the person who displaced me didn’t give it a second thought. Why should they? After all, they didn’t do anything wrong; the space was not assigned to me, except through the unspoken parking lot Social Contract. They were perfectly free to park where they wished, and they did.
 
But to me, this illustrates a larger point. We like to talk about the freedoms this nation of ours provides, and that’s a worthy conversation. But the manner in which we apply those freedoms varies. There are some, like me, who enjoy the exercise of certain freedoms, but I worry about how my freedoms might affect others. The person who now parks where I used to park isn’t malicious—I really don’t think this person cackles wickedly when pulling in and thinks, “Let’s see how Brehm likes this!”—this person just exercised a freedom without worrying how it might affect other people. They weren't out to get me; they just didn't think about me.
 
Lately, though, I've come to worry about those who are malicious in their exercise of freedom, who perhaps are out to get me, who seem to believe their freedom means they don't have to care about me at all--or you--that they are free to do to us as they will.
 
We’ve just begun the study of the French Revolution in my AP European History class, and today we had a discussion about The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen.  A student brought up Article 4 of that document, which states:

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​4. Liberty consists in the freedom to do everything which injures no one else; hence the exercise of the natural rights of each man has no limits except those which assure to the other members of the society the enjoyment of the same rights. These limits can only be determined by law.

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And for a while, I was pretty good: I talked about how everyone in the room has the absolute freedom to throw a punch, but that freedom ends at the tip of someone else’s nose. And then I couldn’t help myself: “How does Article 4 apply to those in America who don’t want to wear masks?” Do we have the freedom to get ourselves sick? Absolutely. Does that mean we have the freedom to get someone else sick? And how—if we don’t know if we’re sick or not—are we to best exercise the freedom we have in relation to the potential injury we could cause someone else? If the limits are to be determined by law, why can’t we enforce a mask mandate?
 
There are a lot of divisions in the nation right now, as any sane reader is no doubt aware, but the one that needs to be fixed soonest, it seems to me, is the one that exists between those with compassion and those without it.
 
This isn’t a Republican/Democrat thing, because I am a registered Neither, and I see those with compassion on both sides. I might suggest those who were involved in the Capitol Riot lack compassion, and I certainly believe that the current President of the United States lacks compassion, as evidenced by how quickly he turned on the very rioters he helped incite. But the vast majority of Republicans I know are decent people who care about others, just like the vast majority of Democrats, and the vast majority of those who don’t vote. The vast majority of Catholics I know have compassion, as do the vast majority of Protestants, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Atheists, and Agnostics.
 
We don’t need a law for this; just a Social Contract. I’ll go forward in compassion, and you’ll go forward in compassion, and then most of us come to expect compassion, and eventually we tacitly agree, this is how we will live. I’ll put my mask on, because I don’t want to get sick, but I also don’t want you to get sick. I’d appreciate it if you would show some compassion and do the same for me. I’ll let you vote, and you let me vote, and if your candidate has more votes than mine, I’ll accept that; I’d appreciate it if—when my candidate has more votes than yours—you’ll do the same.
 
Don’t misunderstand this as a call for unity and healing in regard to the rioters at the Capitol. Those folks broke the Social Contract, and deserve punishment. The President broke the Social Contract, as well, and every day he goes without punishment emboldens others to do likewise.
 
But there are plenty—Republican and Democrat alike—who observe the Social Contract, who wear their masks even when they don’t want to, and who accept that Joe Biden will be the next President of the United States. Those are the people who can exercise their freedoms while respecting the freedoms of others; those folks have compassion for their fellow Americans.
 
This would be helpful in all areas of life, and not just politics. I started with a parking spot. I don’t know how or why the person who parks where I used to park decided to park there, but I don’t really need to know. They parked there, and I chose to be compassionate about that and show concern for their needs, and I found a new parking spot, one that—after all this, I hate to admit it—I kind of like.
 
If you need me, I’ll be at the far end of the seventh row.  I could use the steps.