Patch Voice: You're Driving Me Crazy

By Colleen Walsh Fong

Are other drivers making you crazy? I have to admit I’ve wanted to teach a few driving lessons lately. Like to the guy who laid on his horn and gestured at me while trying to cut me off illegally from the left as I was going straight. When someone attempts this on a busy highway or interstate I always let him in when I can because those roads can be difficult to enter. And I’m not in so much of a rush that I need the nanosecond it takes to be courteous. I often end up passing those who I’ve let in later, or at least end up idling side by side with them at the next traffic light, anyway. I have a little bit of a lead foot and my car gets pretty good pick up.

But this incident happened in the gas station parking lot, so I drew the line and held my ground. That’s when I received his feedback on my driving. He was old enough to a.) Know the rules of the road; and b.) Have more patience and better manners. So I decided to teach a driving lesson. I waved at him and smiled as if he’d let me in. Then I sat in the driveway and let an extra three cars go by before I exited. I figured that he was acting like a three-year old throwing a tantrum and needed a time out. So I gave him one.

I don’t think it worked, though, because he laid on his horn again. I considered giving him another time out for the second horn blast. I was in no hurry. But I didn’t want to tempt the fates. Especially since you never know if a person may be armed and angry or disturbed enough to fire. But my guess is that this man was just being impatient and he didn’t like to be told “no.” Neither did my kids when they were three. And they, too, were unable at that age to admit they were wrong about anything. Luckily, they’ve matured beyond that point, which is more than I can say for many adult drivers on the road.

I’ve watched our metropolis grow from two to six million with little public transportation to offset the increased flow of traffic on the roadways. And nowadays it seems that presentation of a car is a birthright given to sixteen year olds as soon as they get their drivers licenses. I guesstimate that this practice probably doubles the number of cars on the road since the olden days of the 1980’s or 90’s before every kid had a car.

This is not to criticize the parents. Here I admit freely that my children each received cars (old and used ones) when they turned sixteen. They had no other way to get from school to work and to the many extracurricular activities necessary for entrance into the college of their choice. And my husband and I both worked. But new drivers’ inexperience makes them even more dangerous than the guy in the gas station because the roadways around here are packed. Heck, I backed over my parent’s mailbox when I was a sixteen-year old new driver and they lived on a quiet, private cul-de-sac. Pouring a steady stream of young, unpracticed neophytes into multiple-lane mobs full of frustrated drivers is dangerous to them and to the more seasoned drivers on the roads.

Even though I paid the public high school to send my kids through Drivers Ed they actually got behind the wheel only three times each. So I taught my kids to drive. First in parking lots and then on subdivision streets on quiet Sunday mornings. And I drilled them on the rules of the road, which served as a good brush up for me. They’ve changed lots of rules since I last read the book. That’s why I’m so confident of my knowledge of them and my ability to give good driving lessons.

But I’m not that confident about the willingness of other drivers to receive them. Especially when they’re usually already ticked off. So I’ll probably limit my lessons to a select few people and give them on rare occasions when I’m feeling particularly smart-alecky. Who knows, you could be the next lucky recipient. If you see me smile and wave, try to be a good sport and take your time out like a grown up.

Colleen is a freelance writer specializing in producing custom content for businesses and writes regular columns on several media platforms.

Photo Courtesy of by Feelart at FreeDigitalPhotos.net