The Parking Lot Part

Eight hours on the register and by the end my brain was running on a very specific frequency, the one where you can scan a barcode without looking and say 'did you find everything okay' on autopilot and genuinely not register that you said it. Someone in my line asked me a question around hour six and I said 'your total is' before I caught myself. The woman laughed. I laughed too, mostly because what else do you do.

There is a specific quality to the break room at the end of a shift. The clock on the wall is too loud. The plastic chairs are aggressively the wrong height. But there is also something about sitting there for exactly four minutes before you clock out, something almost ceremonial about it, that I have started to genuinely look forward to. Not the room itself. Just the permission to stop moving.

Lane closed. Finally.

The parking lot, though. The parking lot is the best part. I pushed through the door tonight and the air was that particular warm-but-not-hot May thing we've had all week, and the light was doing something nice, and my feet hurt in a way that felt earned rather than just bad. There is a version of tired that actually feels okay. I don't know how to explain the difference except that one kind makes you want to disappear and the other kind just makes you want to stand in a parking lot for a second and not be anyone's cashier.

The parking lot part is the best part.

I drove home with the windows down. Didn't put anything on. Just the sound of it. I've been thinking lately about which parts of ordinary days I actually notice, running has made me weirdly attentive to that, I think, or maybe it's the blog, or maybe I'm just twenty and finally paying attention. Either way: the parking lot. Every time. I will take the parking lot.