My kitchen window

Our house is situated next to a public car park.

Such a location is fortunate or unfortunate, depending upon your perspective.

It is unfortunate, I guess, because it becomes rather noisy in the summer when the softball season is in full swing. Cars are often lined up down the street catching the overflow of the car park and there is additional traffic to contend with.

Some are annoyed by the rhythmic lulling of tennis ball upon court and racket and the till-10pm cussing of players after a bounty of missed shots.

There are more annoying occurrences to suffer, such as the clutter of drunken teens fooling around between the buildings, talking tripe into the decibels and dashing their beer bottles against the pavement once they are done.

Or perhaps the more sinister noise of junkies with their thump thump music turned up too loud, circling the neighbourhood in their clapped out bombs while they wait for their dealers to drop off an "order".

For me though, it is all fodder. Many a strange thing do we see when casually gazing out the kitchen window and into the car park next door. For example.....

-Portable dunnies ablaze (don't ask)
-Dancing drunks
-Kids on a massive Easter egg hunt
-A strange well dressed woman who stops in to use the public toilet at least twice a day 7 days a week then takes a swig of juice and has a piece of chewy without fail before driving away (weird)
-Shoes and sweaters mysteriously found high up in our tree
-School sports day
-The pre-school teacher skidding into the car park and scurrying in doing the pile of paper and coffee balancing act not two minutes before the kids arrive each morning
-Dog fights
-Grown men racing remote controlled cars
-Old men falling off bikes and hobbling home (dear me!!)
-A maniac driver plowing into the fence across the road...then speeding away
-And other things that are too intriguing and wonderful to describe in detail.

If only I were an artist... I could paint you a picture of the two people I saw crossing paths in the midnight rain while walking their dogs.

They were talking, seemingly oblivious that they were soaking to the skin. The scene was lit only by the glow of a single orange street light, reflected numerous times by surrounding puddles.

Slower and slower they moved together until they were in each others embrace, and although they arrived at that spot from different directions, they left the scene together.

I witnessed this while rocking a cranky baby to sleep one night. I was looking down from above. It was strange.... almost like a scene from a movie. I guess you had to be there.