Have you ever seen one of these signs?

I’ve seen these “stork parking” signs mainly at KMart and BabiesRUs (of course), and they always kind of make me chuckle.  First of all, who’s really enforcing these signs?  I don’t see any parking monitors waiting at your car door and threatening you with a ticket if you don’t show them your ultrasound pictures.  And second, I think they are unnecessary.  Not that I have anything against the trials and suffering of pregnant women.  I am, if you remember, 32 1/2 weeks pregnant myself (but who’s counting?).  But when it comes to parking privileges, I think that somebody in the customer service department needs to re-evaulate its reasoning.

Obviously, sombody somewhere, probably about ten years ago, thought that those poor tired pregnant women shouldn’t be made to walk the extra ten yards necessary to get into the retail location of their choice because of their delicate condition.  Did nobody remember that said pregnant woman then has to walk all around said retail location in order to accomplish her purpose for coming there?  Unless the store is situated at the top of a steep hill, getting her a little bit closer to the door really isn’t going to save her that much discomfort.  If you wanted to find something that really would help, they should have an “express line” stall in the bathroom reserved for expectant mothers only, or one of the checkstands. 

Also, if this is a first-time expectant mother, all she has to do is open her car door and simply waddle her way into the store on her own, not realizing that she is experiencing that freedom for the few remaining weeks she has left.  If people in the parking services department at any major shopping locale really wanted to curry favor with their clientele, they would set aside the closest possible parking spaces for mothers with small children.  In my experience, it is much more inconvenient and stressful to unload an infant and a todller out of their car seats while keeping any older children from getting killed by passing traffic or their siblings and get everyone inside the store safely than it is to haul my pregnant belly a few extra feet.  They could call it something cute, like “Munchkin Parking Only” or mark it like the car pool lane: “Must have two or more children to park.”  Now that is an idea that makes sense!