Road rage

Let me preface this by saying that I live near a city that really does not have massive traffic snarl messes and three hour commutes for those who live a mere twenty miles away. Whenever I complain about rush hour traffic to my sister, who lives in LA, she guffaws and gives me a look of utter derision (even if we are conversing on the phone, I can tell she is giving me “that look.”)

She would argue that I have no right to complain about rush hour traffic. That I have NO IDEA what rush hour traffic is like. And she would be right. But having driven through Chicago, another American metropolis renowned for its traffic jams, once in my adult life on a cross country drive, I vowed that as God was my witness, I would never drive through Chicago again!

So, no, veritably, this city where I live now does NOT have a huge rush hour traffic problem.

All the same, people around here drive like fricking idiots!

Normally I work from 10 to 6 and miss the worst of rush hour on both ends. That suits me just fine. I don’t need any more stress in my already stressful life. But right now I am working 9 to 5, and the drive in and out of the city is aging me more rapidly than Lancôme wrinkle resistant cream can compensate for. I am, I guess, a fragile flower when it comes to driving amongst throngs of aggressive, maniacal commuters. They are all Type A, high testosterone idiots, while I am more like Jesus turning the other cheek. I usually try to let other people merge in front of me, kind of that whole taking turns idea that we learned back in kindergarten, but that doesn’t mean I want EVERYONE to merge in front of me. And I hate it when people tailgate me in the slow lane, especially when I am already exceeding the posted speed limit. You want to go faster, buster, pass me! Their antagonistic behavior merely makes me want to slow down. (Passive-aggressiveness is my forte.)

It irks me when people merge onto the highway BEHIND me, even though the cars immediately in front of me and I have not even reached that part of the road where you are supposed to start merging. The only way to counter this annoying behavior is for me to merge even earlier than the jackasses behind me, which probably only serves to irritate those in front of me. So, I become part of the problem instead of part of the solution. This disturbs me to no end. In order to survive, I have to affect an aggressive and assholish persona that is the antithesis of my true self. Not good.

When I drive in to work at 10 in the morning, the commute is a relative breeze. Unless there has been an accident, I rarely even have to slow down once I hit the major highway, and it doesn’t matter if I start to daydream a wee bit, which I am wont to do, Walter Mitty and I having far more in common than I might want to admit. When I have to be at work at 9, however, I am surrounded by a throng of crazed Indy 500 nutcases and I have no idea where these speed demons think they are going to go, as invariably the highway ahead turns into a virtual parking lot, especially if there has been an accident, which there often is as high speed and stopped traffic usually don’t mix well.

A few weeks ago, while I was on my normal 10-6 shift, I was trying to pass a slow-moving truck (who, truth be told, was really not all that slow as he was going at least the posted speed limit). No one was approaching behind me in the fast lane, so I moved into the passing lane. All of a sudden – and I still have no idea where this person came from, but he scared the bejesus out of me – there was a car RIGHT behind me and he slammed on his brakes, gave me the finger, and cursed up a blue storm. (I don’t actually know what he was saying, but I could see him in my rear view mirror and he was PISSED.) Never mind that I was already exceeding the speed limit, and HE had sneaked up on me at 85-90 miles per hour from the SLOW lane. He had most definitely NOT been in the fast lane.

I saw my life flash before my eyes. Literally. This near death experience prompted me to go out the very next day and buy a fireproof safe that was on sale at Target in which to put my will. I was certain this guy was going to hit me. I floored my Subaru, which doesn’t really amount to doing much of anything, and swerved as far to the left as I could while he swerved as far to the right as he could. He was super duper annoyed that I had “gotten in his way.” Silly me, I don’t usually monitor the traffic behind me in the slow lane when I am going to pass someone in front of me, except to see if there are people already moving over or have a blinker on indicating they are moving over. I AM focusing on who or what is approaching in the fast lane behind me. When I see NOTHING in the fast lane and a car behind me in the slow lane going slower than I am, I do not often think – Gee, I wonder if there is some asshole maniac speeding up behind THAT car in the slow lane and he is going to swerve back into the fast lane to go around ALL of us right when I decide to pass this slow moving vehicle in front of me. The asshole maniac, of course, thinks HE is the only one on the road and that it is his prerogative to drive wherever the hell he wants to whenever the hell he wants to at whatever the hell speed he wants to.

He is one of that breed who thinks the highway at rush hour is a race track and he is Mario Andretti. He weaves in and out of traffic like the other cars are orange cones. He thinks nothing of driving 85 miles in the slow lane in order to pass people in the fast lane, and he often takes advantage of exit lanes to swerve around traffic in the slow lane on the right side, as opposed to using the fast lane on the left.

You may notice that I have wielded a lot of HEs. I do not wish to sound sexist, but I do have to say that usually the people I have seen driving like this are men. Don’t get me wrong, there are a lot of maniacal asshole women drivers, too, but they tend to be the ones talking on their cells phones whilst applying makeup and just changing lanes whenever they feel like it. They don’t seem to be the ones who fantasize they are NASCAR drivers playing Grand Theft Auto.

I find this aggressive speed demon boneheaded behavior not only scary, but downright puzzling. It doesn’t make any sense to me. WHY are these men driving this way when two or three miles down the road they are going to have to come to a near standstill???? And WHY do they think they have the god-given right to drive as fast as they want to and endanger everyone else on the road??? I just couldn’t figure it out.

Then… I heard this great observation on NPR’s Car Talk. The Clackett brothers were saying, partly tongue in cheek, of course, as they are men, that men think rules apply to everyone else and not to them. Rules are designed for OTHER people. In particular, speed limits are designed for other drivers, all those bad, slow, old lady incompetent drivers. They, on the other hand, KNOW how to handle a car, KNOW how to drive fast and furious, and thus it is their RIGHT to drive this way and everyone else on the road be damned and get out of their way RIGHT NOW!!!

It was like a light bulb went on in my head. That was EXACTLY how these speed demon drivers behaved.

While that certainly explained this arrogant, dangerous breed of driver, it did nothing whatsoever to get rid of them. They are everywhere, especially on the major highways. When I complained of this to a co-worker, she suggested I try an alternate route into the city, one that paralleled the river on a smaller road that went through towns and had numerous stop lights. I didn’t like this road for that very reason; plus, it was plagued by a plethora of potholes. I preferred the smoother, wider highway that reminded me – and obviously everyone else on it -- of the Autobahn. Nonetheless, I decided to try her suggested route the next morning, just so I could compare it with the Testosterone Thruway. Of course, it would be the day that there was a major accident on one of the bridges leading into the city, and traffic was slowed down and backed up for miles. Plus, when it was moving, people were skirting in front of me and changing lanes without using turning signals and pretty much being pushy assholes. A car behind me actually honked at me to move up – into the middle of a busy intersection when the light was red in my direction so that she (yes, women are asshole drivers, too) could go around me and turn right, even though it said “No Turn on Red.” Yet, somehow it was I who was the asshole!

So… in the end, neither route did much for my blood pressure or ensuing angina problems. It was six of one, half dozen of another. Personally, I can hardly wait til my schedule reverts to its normal 10 to 6, so most of the speed demon maniacal aggressive morons are out of the way, or at least have WAY more Lebensraum to conduct their silly, death-defying antics. I realize that all of these people must have far, far more important lives than I do and their getting to work five minutes before I do or home five minutes before I do is a vital part of their all-important days.

I, meanwhile, will have to start practicing my yoga breathing again and continue to fantasize about getting a job on a desert island… albeit NOT whilst driving to and from work.