BOB BAKER / OK, I’m Going to Fess Up
This is for the jerk in the blue van who raced around me the other day, stopped in front of my Saturn, got out, walked back toward me and yelled furiously:
“You cut me off, you son of a bitch!”
Three things, buddy:
First, you’re not a jerk.
Second, I was wrong. I did cut you off.
Third, I do it all the time.
You don’t know how hard it was for me to type that last sentence.
If there’s one thing I like to get on my high horse about it’s the absence of civility in motoring. Give me a chance and I’ll run my mouth forever about the rudeness of drivers who won’t let a poor soul slide into their lane of traffic, or who honk if you accidentally force them to put even the slightest pressure on their brakes when you cut in front of them. Like you’ve challenged their manhood--sorry, personhood. Scratch that. Manhood. Women don’t seem to have as much of a problem with this.
Anyway, when I’m giving this speech, I break into a plaintive, Rodney King-like sputter that asks: How are we supposed to all drive on these roads, all 5.5 million of us in Los Angeles County, if we don’t cut each other some slack when the other guy miscalculates a little bit? Were we meant to live in fear of a freeway shooting at the slightest transgression?
When I’m giving this speech, I offer up a mechanic’s metaphor: We need a certain amount of personal viscosity--the quality of forgiveness--to prevent the friction between motorists from turning our society into one of those old Disney cautionary driving cartoons where Goofy and everyone else goes nuts behind the wheel.
What I never think about, when I’m enjoying this rant, is the possibility that rather than being a victim, I’m a suspect.
*
“You cut me off, you son of a bitch!”
He was maybe 50, wearing a T-shirt. You would have thought I ran over his foot. We were on a four-lane city street. Could have been anywhere.
I rolled down my window. It was early, maybe 7 a.m., and I was too sleepy to wonder whether he had a gun.
“I didn’t see you,” I said evenly, and I was going to explain that the morning dew was playing havoc with my visibility but--
“I don’t care!” he said. “You be careful, sir!” And then he walked away, in a huff, and drove off, and I got on the freeway and headed to work and forgot all about it.
For a couple minutes.
And then, to my surprise, I started to feel guilty. Idiot, I told myself. You did see him. You made a right turn onto a busy street, you didn’t accelerate enough, and you made the other guy slam on his brakes. You could have hurt somebody. You almost caused an accident. You always do that.
Yep, that’s my dirty little secret. I make a slow right turn when I ought to wait, and then I get mad at the guy who honks at me from behind, and go into my self-righteous rap: What are they getting mad about? Why can’t they slow down like I slow down when somebody cuts me off? You never see me getting mad about slowing down for other people because I believe in civility and civility is the viscosity that--
You wanna know a little secret? I was lying to myself. I knew all the time I was making other people slam on their brakes as I turned into their lane. I liked that it bothered them. I was enjoying some passive-aggressive pleasure in making them do it, teaching them some manners, telling myself it was them driving too fast, not me driving too slow.
“Screw you!” I’d say when they’d honk. “Gimme a break! What’s your hurry?”
It never dawned on me that I was crossing the line from stubborn to dangerous because outside my car I don’t act like that. There’s something about the insular nature of the automobile, something about the way it shields us with its stereo system and its bucket seats, something that creates a separate world with its own mind-set. Until somebody calls you on it.
*
“You cut me off, you son of a bitch!”
You’re right. I’m sorry. I won’t do it anymore. That’s what I wish I had said. I’m trying harder.
A couple of days after my little confrontation, a real one happened on the Long Beach Freeway in Monterey Park. Midmorning, Sunday: Juan Grimaldo of Bell Gardens is driving north when he and another motorist in a Mitsubishi get into some kind of argument and the other guy pulls a gun and fires. Grimaldo dies six hours later.
That’ll raise your consciousness.
I’m no longer reveling in victimhood. I’m no longer holding myself up self-righteously as the model driver, the good citizen, the flag-waver for civility. Sure, I’ve never been held at fault in an accident. Sure, I’ve had less than half a dozen moving violations in 30-plus years of driving, but that’s all past tense. I have a driving problem and I know it. I’m sorry there’s not a 12-step program I can enter. (“Hi. My name’s Bob. I have a driving problem. I drive too slow and make unsafe turns and react arrogantly when people call me on it.”)
Every program needs a slogan. Let’s try this one for starters: Don’t express your personality through your driving. There are a lot of guys in blue vans out there.
