This month, “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” the beloved album by the Beatles, turned 50. While the record is perhaps best remembered for songs such as “A Day in the Life” and “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” for 26-year-old Cara Pease, a parking enforcement officer in Northampton, its most notable track is “Lovely Rita,” the tune about a meter maid.
“Everyone sings that to me all the time,” Pease says, on the verge of an eye roll. “And everyone who says it thinks they’re being really funny, so I kind of play along, like ‘Oh yeah, I’ve never heard that before,’ but I get that probably twice a day.”
Pease grew up in Worthington in Hampshire County, although she went to high school in Dalton so that she could run track. She has been a parking enforcement officer (or PEO) for almost three years. She started part time while she worked a handful of other jobs.
Now she’s a full-time PEO, and she also works part time at a dog daycare in Easthampton and as a volunteer firefighter in Worthington.
No one likes getting a parking ticket — and PEOs can get a bad rap. We sat down with Pease on a hot and sunny Tuesday during her lunch break at her typical spot, the State Street Deli, to get to know the woman behind the ticketing machine.
Morning routine: “I usually have a bagel and coffee, and I come here and I get in uniform, and I make everyone mad who’s getting their coffee, because everyone tries to run in — we start parking enforcement at 8, which people know — and they’re like, ‘OK, I’ll just run to Starbucks and get my coffee,’ and then they get so mad. They’re like, ‘But I was just getting my coffee!’ And I’m like, ‘Yeah, but you have to pay, it’s just my job.” (She has a cinnamon raisin bagel and takes her coffee with milk and sugar.)
Going the distance: “I walk 10 to15 miles a day, I would guess. All the other girls have those Fitbits, but I don’t have one.”
Familiar faces: “You have regulars — like, there are people that are always out walking their dogs who let me pet the dogs. A lot of the homeless people, they start to know us. Northampton’s a really colorful place, like there’s all sorts of different people and different businesses and different restaurants, and it’s all a mix of things.”
Lunch: “I get broccoli salad a lot. They make different little sandwiches each day. It kind of depends on my mood. Or Sam’s Pizzeria on Main Street. Sometimes he gives us free food. He’s awesome.”
Best part of the job: “I love being outside. I get to walk around all day, and there’s no one breathing down my neck.”
Worst part of the job: “Most people don’t like us, but you get used to that pretty quick. I think it’s probably just the elements — like, when it gets really hot like today or when it’s really, really cold in winter. I wear, like, 18 layers in the winter. I waddle like a penguin. You get underarmour and big jackets and hats and boots. It’s really cute.” (She’s being sarcastic.)
Ticketing the ticketer: “I did get a ticket one time, while I was working. I’d just started, and one of the other girls, we get little employee passes to park in one of the lots, and there’s meters in that lot, and we’re not supposed to park at the meters, but I didn’t know that, so I parked there, and she gave me a ticket. So I got out of work from parking and had a parking ticket. Other than that, no, I’m pretty good.”
Unwinding after work: “I read a lot. I don’t make a dinner lot; Eric, that’s my boyfriend, he actually is a really good cook, so he cooks a lot. I walk. I guess it’s weird, I walk after work. I walk like a million miles, and then I go home and I walk. But I live on a dirt road, and it’s nice.” (The last book she read was “The Guardian” by Nicholas Sparks.)
Close quarters: “I have five dogs. I have a Goldendoodle, a Golden Retriever, a Beagle, a Pit Bull and a Jack Russell mix.” (Their names: Smith, Tayla, Aspen, Zoey and Brady. And she fosters dogs, too.)
Next vacation: “I want to go to Yellowstone one day. I have a little fund; I keep all my spare cash so I can go there. I want to see big mountains and wolves — I want to see wolves.”
Career goal: “I want to be an animal-control officer. I went to the Academy for it, but it’s a really hard job to get into.”