Careful by Steve Casner

Author:Steve Casner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2017-05-05T10:50:13+00:00

I had sex in a Porsche 911 Turbo convertible doing about 120 down the highway looking over the girl’s shoulder. So awesome while she orgasmed. Awesome!

Would It Kill Us to Think of Others?

Walking across a heavily trafficked street in downtown Mountain View, California, I watched a middle-aged, well-dressed man enter the crosswalk after the Walk sign had illuminated. A driver approaching the intersection seemed incredulous that the light would dare turn red as she screeched to a stop in the middle of the crosswalk. The man in the crosswalk instinctively held out both hands, palms forward, as if to brace himself from the impact that stopped just short of happening. As soon as that situation was under control, another itinerant driver turning left pushed into the crosswalk from the other side. The man in the crosswalk switched one of his hands, making the stop gesture toward the second car. I couldn’t help notice what a funny pose this man was striking. He looked like a Heisman Trophy with no hands left for the football. He looked at both drivers with an expression that seemed to ask, “What the f&#% are you people thinking?”

Drivers aren’t the only ones on the road with an unflagging sense of entitlement. Pedestrians stroll into the street midblock without casting a glance at the drivers behind them, who they assume will stop regardless of the situation. Cyclists disregard stop signs and red lights and leave drivers and pedestrians to sort out what happens next.

Psychologist Maria Konnikova sums up the situation in her New Yorker column: “Whichever mode of transportation you happen to be using . . . you are correct, no matter the scenario. Everyone else is in your way, wrong, annoying, and otherwise a terrible human being.” What leads us to feel so entitled whether we are in a car, on a bicycle, or on foot? Konnikova points out that most all of us play at least two of these roles, and many of us all three. But we seldom seem to be able to look at any given situation from the other person’s vantage point.

But being annoyed by the existence of other travelers is just the beginning of the madness. The news is filled with cases of road rage that end in roadside fistfights, smashed windshields, weapons beings brandished, and sometimes even murders. But aggressive behavior is hardly limited to these notorious few. In a recent survey conducted by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety, 80 percent of drivers admitted to having done something rude or dangerous behind the wheel of a car in the previous year. Fifty-one percent of drivers admitted to intentionally tailgating another vehicle. Forty-seven percent reported yelling at other drivers and 45 percent honked their horn to show annoyance or anger. Angry gestures were popular with 33 percent of all respondents, while 12 percent of motorists reported intentionally cutting off another driver. And AAA’s analysis assures us that the problem is getting worse.

Few of us are the pathological types who show up on the road looking for a fight.

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