The Riches Under Ground in DC

All over the city there are entrances to DC under ground where we can park our gleaming vehicles safe from the weather, fender benders, thieves, and parking ticket ladies. Down fluorescent-lit, hot and fumy, steeply curved ramps we hide away our cars while we go off and shop, or work, or whatever.  But you do have to calculate in the time it takes to park and retrieve the vehicle whenever you plan an activity, one of which is to be waiting for your car to be brought to you. In fact, I'm sorry to say that I have driven my car a couple of times downtown, parked it underground and gone home on the bus forgetting about my beloved car altogether!  I always feel a bit sheepish about picking it up the next day but I know it's been well taken care of and at least I knew where it was once I got home and hubster asked "honey, where's your car?" Another odd thing is that all these entrances and ramps downward look very similar and there's been a few times when I forgot which underground garage I parked in or how to get back into the garage to retrieve the vehicle. Sometimes the stairways and elevators open up into another building above ground or there's no apparent pedestrian way out of the depths.  Then, of course, there's the problem of remembering which floor level it was parked on if you are allowed to self-park.  There's something very odd about wandering about in an underground parking lot looking for your car even if you do have an electronic key that you can beep for the car. There's just been too many movies or urban legends where people get run over or robbed or shot in parking lots and something about the low ceilings and minimal lighting creates a scary atmosphere. These garages are deep, and if you've seen a building constructed you know how big the hole in the ground is when they plan for these. There's a whole world in DC that's underground, filled with shining metal objects worth hundreds of thousands of dollars in the aggregate, guarded by very few custodians, and that we just take for granted as part of our 21st century world. Just imagine, for instance, trying to explain an underground car parking lot to Leonardo Da Vinci, or Genghis Khan or someone even a hundred years ago. They'd probably say it wasn't possible, even if they understood its feasibility. Another amazing wonder of our city.