Why is every parking space at the Mall of America always full?

I think my favorite thing about the Mall of America parking ramp, besides leaving it, is the way it shudders now and then when cars come down the ramp. Nothing like being under five stories of concrete and automobiles and thinking: Worst-case scenario, I survive a collapse, and have to spend five days under rubble with an Old Navy bag as my only reading material.

No, I don't think it will happen. It's perfectly safe. This isn't one of those places where an unscrupulous contractor thinks, "We can substitute old, past-their-sell-date Twizzlers for rebar. They're stiff enough." But just in case, I hand out jerky to the family when we leave the car.

Why? Aren't we eating at the mall?

It's so the dogs can find us.

I took a quick trip to the mall the other day because there's a store there that has my size. Every three months I have to replace the cheap pair of pants they sold me the last time. I think they're actually made of the scratch-off stuff you find on lottery tickets, but they fit. I thought I'd park in the East Ramp for easy access, and I immediately recalled the problem of the mall's parking ramp: Every space is always taken. You troll around the first floor, and you are filled with a strange anger: "Why are you people still shopping? You should have enough by now."

Hey — there's someone walking to her car! You follow, because suddenly stalking is A-OK, and you see another car in the distance. "Don't even think about it, pal. I had a lock on this one before you saw her." The pedestrian boop-boops her alarm, opens the trunk, puts in the bags, shuts the lid — and WALKS BACK TO THE MALL. Gah. If you're going back, if you're not leaving, you should be walking through the ramp with orange sticks in both hands, pointing people away from your car so they don't get their hopes up. You drive on, and as you pass the waiting car that was once your sworn enemy, you exchange a rueful nod, like a World War I fighter ace saluting a noble adversary. Perhaps we shall meet again, mon ami.

Ah, there's a family coming down the row. Mom pushing a stroller, Dad carrying a little kid — a happy afternoon in the amusement park, no doubt. For a moment the parking woes melt away, and you recall taking your child to Camp Snoopy. Her bright smile on the roller coaster. That look of delicious fright on the ride that went up and came down with jerky bumps. A long-ago day she'll never recall. Why can't they remember these things? Why are the earliest memories like water poured on sand, swallowed without a trace?

By now there are two other cars who think they have a claim. Really? I realize no one else has done the thing that establishes your claim, and I switch on my turn signal. This is the equivalent of the lion standing over the dead zebra and roaring his dominance.

Parking is a pain, and it's one of the reasons my visits to the mall are rare. Solutions? I don't know. An app that lets you reserve spaces, maybe, because, of course, apps solve everything. Or just turn one ramp into valet only; I'd happily pay. I'd even push the seat back and change the radio for the driver.

What's that, take light rail? And lose my sense of freedom?