Beep Beep

Ahh driving, one of my few favorite things in life. There is a lot to talk about when it comes to driving. There are good drivers, bad drivers, good and bad driving habits, road rage, traffic, slow drivers, fast drivers, clueless drivers, lost drivers, aggressive drivers, and most common of all, a**hole drivers. These are the ones who are aggressive, fast, unskilled, and often times clueless or lost, generally not caring whatsoever if you get into a fiery car crash or anything, so long as they get one car in front of you.

People often times show their true selves when they get behind the wheel. For some reason, they feel invincible behind their tinted glass windows and drowned in their loud music. They floor it in their tricked out Honda Civic or Toyota Corolla, going from zero to sixty in just under nine seconds. They know that rear spoiler they had installed is really giving them enough down force to get that fast in under ten seconds, and that new tailpipe they put on themselves makes it sound like they are actually going fast, as it alternately bounces of the asphalt and the rear bumper. Even if they are not going fast, they can at least weave in and out of other drivers, and look cool doing it. Safety comes second to looking good in the high octane world of driving on the parkway at 65 miles per hour. “I am going fast and I look cool, so there must not be anyone else on the road at all” they think to themselves.

Others are a bit calmer. They drive the speed limit, use their blinkers, and for some reason, rarely have the slightest clue of where they are going, changing lanes every four seconds and reading a map the size of the windshield. Some are on family vacations, lost in a strange state they have been to only once before; they swear they know how to get there by memory, and insist on doing so. Some are in a crowded car, trying to get to the movies and somehow missed the exit, ended up in one town over, and are forever lost in the urban jungle. They search desperately for a way out, taking as many turns as possible claiming each new turn is the right way, and refuse to read a single street sign, as doing so would most likely take them one block over, returning them to a realm of familiarity.

Unfortunately, I have been involved in a vehicular collision. It was fairly minor, and I was not in motion at the time. It was a raining morning on the way to school, and as I sat in a line of cars at a stop sign, I feel a sudden violent jolt forward. As an automatic reaction to the sudden motion, my foot pushed harder onto the brake, preventing any further contact with vehicles in front of me. My first thought was “Shit, I’m going to be late for school,” not even thinking that there may be an injured person behind me. I put the car in park, and got out into the rain. Immediately I walk around to the damage to see the cracked and shattered rear bumper as I hear “I’m so sorry dude” repeated several times. After a moment I look up at the voice, only to discover it was a fellow student. Luckily, we were able to get to school on time, and resolve the issue without filing a police report or insurance claims.

As previously stated, I love driving. It is one of the few things in life that makes me truly happy. I can have a need for speed at times, as going fast and drifting through turns is almost always more fun than going to pick up milk, but I wouldn’t dare drive like that on public roads or around other drivers. For now, 45mph on the way to school is more than enough for me.