It was my young daughter's innocent question one day that made me realize I needed to change my ways.
"Mom," she asked, "are all the other drivers morons?"
Ouch.
Since Webster's gives one definition for moron as "a very stupid person," I'll go out on a limb and say that there are a lot of morons on the road. But that didn't make it right for me to call them that - and certainly not within earshot of my children.
Too many of us drive around angry these days. There's no doubt that many of us feel shortchanged when it comes to time. I've seen gals putting on makeup while steering one-handed. It's commonplace for folks to talk on their cellphones as they drive, and I am guilty of that. How many of us eat a meal while driving? And not just fast-food - once I saw a guy driving down a Dallas highway with a big pan of spaghetti propped on the steering wheel. My jaw dropped in amazement as I watched him scooping the strands of pasta into his mouth.
I can multi-task with the best of them, but I've come to realize that doing too many tasks at once can be dangerous. Juggling too many tasks can certainly be stressful, and when we take that stress behind the wheel, we are more prone to anger. And when we are angry, we put ourselves and others at risk.
Once as I entered the overpass from Interstate 35E to the Dallas North Tollway, the clutch cable broke, and my car wouldn't move. Passing drivers honked and screamed at me for partially blocking their way. There were numerous rude hand gestures. With my toddler and infant daughters in the car, I was terrified to get out in the heavy traffic. Fortunately an angel in the form of a truck driver came and pushed me to the tollbooth so I could exit. I have never forgotten the feeling of being the victim of so much hostility, so much anger over something that I could not help.
A few years ago, in a RoadRagers.com survey, more than 11,000 folks answered questions about their actions behind the wheel, some of which could be considered aspects of road rage. "I try to be a polite and courteous driver," said 76.9 percent of the respondents, but 69.8 percent said "I tailgate another driver to encourage them to speed up and go faster." I wasn't a math whiz in school, but those sets of numbers don't compute. Somebody's fudging.
One stress expert says that we set ourselves up for trouble when we don't allow ourselves enough time to do the things we need to do, then try to make up for lost time on the road. When we do that, everything that interferes with our attempt to gain that lost time adds to our frustration level, and has the potential to erupt as road rage.
We can control whether we let the stress in our lives become anger that we direct toward others. I have learned that if I allow myself enough time, drive courteously and safely, and don't take the bad driving of others personally, I stay a lot calmer. So nowadays when I see other drivers do stupid things, I try to remember that there are circumstances of which I'm unaware. I say a prayer that they'll realize that their carelessness behind the wheel could be dangerous, and I hope that they'll do better next time. And I try not to call them morons (at least not out loud).
Unless they're texting. Then they're morons.
(Dallas Morning News Community Voices 8-23-09)
