Need help out to your car, ma'am?

While I am very impressed with the park job someone
did here, this would take advanced car finding skills that I do not possess!

What does it say about a person when they can’t remember where they parked their car?  Okay, that happens to a lot of us once in a while.  But, what does it say about a person that can’t remember what car they were driving and where they parked it?  

Today I tried to forcibly open the hatch of a vehicle that was not mine.  Leaving the supermarket, I pushed my cart up to the back of a SUV that I thought was mine.  Clicking my key fob several times with fervor, and pointing it at the hatch door like I was “casting a spell”, I finally thought I heard it unlock.  So, I tried to lift the hatch handle - with a lot of force.  At the same time as my hand was unsuccessfully pulling up the still locked hatch handle, I noticed the back window.  “Wow, how did my car get so dirty?”  Well, MY car is not that dirty.  The car I was trying to open was Not my car, not even the same make, or really even the same color.  Mine was several spaces away.  In my defense, the impostor vehicle was about the same size “spatially” in the parking space.  Lucky for me, the car alarm did not go off, though I am sure someone, in a nearby vehicle, saw me trying to force the hatch handle up.  Eleven years of driving a white BMW sedan and I never got it mixed up in a parking lot.  Three months with a Korean SUV, and I’m trying to open a Ford.  Apparently, I now drive such a generic vehicle, that it will not register with my brain.

I gave a little laugh, in case someone was watching me, and nonchalantly pushed the cart to my car where I proceeded to “cast a spell” until I heard the click. Thank a god the Teenager wasn’t with me.  Or worse, the courtesy clerk who asked if I needed help out to my car.  Who knew that I did?

In my moment of reflection, safe at home, I’m still a bit, well, confused.  Was I that preoccupied leaving the market?  Did I have a mini stroke?  Did I look before I merged onto the highway when I drove home?  Can’t remember actually looking, but I did make it home and I don't remember any honking horns.

What if that other SUV had been unlocked?  Egads, I probably would have opened the driver's door and got in before I figured it out.  Okay, maybe I wouldn’t have gone that far.  But what about in twenty years?  Is this how it starts?  

It’s time to put a cool sticker on my back window...  and do a good visual check before trying to open a stranger’s car.  It might also be time to start taking gingko biloba.