Lessons Learned

I just got back from a Time Out for Women, sponsored by Deseret Book, a fun chance to get together with other women in the Portland area and hear some great speakers. I had a great time and really loved most of the presentations.  It's always good to get perspective on one's own challenges.

I drove a group of women to the Conference Center in Portland Friday night and then again on Saturday.  On Friday night we had a most interesting experience, from which I have learned a few lessons.

Lesson Learned #1 -  When you get an uneasy feeling, which could perhaps be a prompting, follow it. Don't question it.

This is what happened: Our group arrived at the Conference Center in my van and tried to decide where to park. We ruled out a few options because they seemed too dangerous to access at the end of the evening (ha ha ha - ironic twist coming soon).  We chose a parking lot near the center which was mostly deserted at the time. As we were paying at the automated kiosk, some sorta scary looking young men were also lingering around the kiosk. We talked about the price of parking, and they said something about a "rave" which would be held in a nearby building and said that the parking lot would be filling up with people coming for the rave party. Ding, ding, ding, ding . . . does that send off warning bells in your head?  Well, it certainly triggered some uneasy feelings in me. I felt like we should go park somewhere else, but didn't do anything about it.  After all, we had already paid our $8, the parking lot was empty right now and so convenient to the Conference Center.  So, we left the car and headed into the Conference.

Fast forward to 9:30 p.m. when we left Time Out, which had been peaceful and uplifting. The closer we got to our car, the more the environment became the opposite - really loud, raucous music, flashing lights from inside the building, groups of kids everywhere (wearing very little clothing but lots of piercings and tattoos), and the smell of marijuana permeating the air. When we reached my van we found five or six young men leaning on it. We asked them to move and then jumped into the van.  Whew - on our way.  Right?  Wrong. People had parked in such a haphazard manner that we could not back out - there was literally no room to swing the car backward to get out of the parking lot. I tried twice, with one of the women with me directing me from behind.  Couldn't do it. Pretty soon we had the attention of many of the kids hanging around.

Here's Lesson Learned #2 - sometimes people who look pretty scary can actually be very helpful. There were three or four guys and one girl (who literally had a flashing belly button, which her outfit readily revealed) who guided us from all around the car for half an hour as we tried and tried again to maneuver the van out. The conversation went something like this:  "Back up one more inch. Now stop. Now crank all the way to the right and go forward two inches. Now crank all the way to the left and back about four inches."We made progress, but it was an impossible task. Finally, one of the guys grabbed a friend (whose car was behind us) and told him to back his car up. However, this was tricky, because apparently this kid was SO sure his car would be stolen in this very dangerous parking lot, he had removed some of the key mechanical parts of the car and stored them in another friend's car so no one could drive it away. Yes, this is the lot where I left my vehicle. Finally, he put his car into neutral and pushed it back a few inches, just enough for us to barely squeak around.  We thanked the very nice, albeit scary looking young people and were on our way.

I was really calm through all of this - I don't fall apart easily during a crisis - but afterward I was quite shaken. When I got home I had a headache bigger than Texas, and then I couldn't sleep for many hours. Then up again the next day at 6 to drive the group back to Portland.  It's kind of ironic that we parked in the same parking lot (the rave was over, but the parking lot was full of litter and trash.)  It really was in a good location, and during the day much more likely to be a good choice. But, we had learned one more lesson.

Lesson Learned #3 - Always park in such a way that we won't have to BACK UP to leave.  We did this, and pulled right out with ease at the end of the day. 

 It was really a wonderful weekend, and I needed the time to think and journal while I listened to speakers.  I feel inspired and ready to be a better person.