COURTENAY - A woman who uses a wheelchair was brought to tears after finding a mean-spirited fake parking violation ticket on her windshield.

Tammy Garrett has been battling cancer on and off for 10 years, which is why she’s in a wheelchair. She drives a van with a ramp to accommodate her wheelchair, but says a lack of dedicated handicapped parking stalls has forced her to take two spots, which has sparked outrage, and most recently, led to a threatening note on her windshield.

She parked at the Courtenay Airpark Thursday morning to join her mom for some exercise. She didn’t notice the note until she had already returned to her van and was seated behind the wheel with her chair stowed in the back. So she waited until she arrived home before she had a chance to get a proper device to reach it.

The note read:

“This is not a ticket, but if it were within my power, you would receive two. Because of your Bull Headed, inconsiderate feeble attempt at parking, you have taken enough room for a 20 mule team, 2 elephants, and a safari of pygmies from the African Interior. The reason for giving you this, is so that in the future you may think of someone else, other than yourself. Besides that, I don’t like domineering, egotistical or simple minded drivers and you probably fit into one or more of these. I sign off wishing you an early transmission failure on the express way. Also may the fleas of a thousand camels infest in your armpits.”

This brought her to tears.

Tammy says she’s always had good intentions, “The reason I’m taking two is not because I’m being a jerk, I have no choice. A lot of time there’s not that many handicapped stalls, so I can’t even take one anyway. And I’ll take the furthest two that I can find. I never take one right up front, but for some reason that really irritates people.”

And this isn’t the first time.

“I’ve had mothers with children pointing out my parking job while I’m rolling up to the van, telling me how terrible I am. I had a guy accost me at Walmart at my car, banging on the window wondering why I’m taking so long to get in the car and how dare I take up two spaces.”

Tammy says her van is clearly marked with a handicapped decal hanging at the front, as well as a sticker on the side. The seats are missing, and it is equipped with a ramp.

“You can make an obvious inference if you just took the time, rather than ruin someone’s day.”

She hopes that people wouldn’t be so quick to jump to conclusions and would be more sympathetic.

“When you see it, maybe instead of getting mad, just take a second and think ‘is there a reason they’re parking that way?’ and check their van to make sure it’s not a handicap van before you do something nasty.”