Another blog on driving? I’ll be damned. Well, this is not about zen driving or is it?
I have come to notice, many a times that, if you can let others have their way, in driving, things look a lot better. That way, we all get home sooner and with a lot less BP.
When you are driving, you invariably search the opposite faces for their expression. It could be that of car driver or scooter or someone crossing or a policeman. And very often, you notice, if someone gives you a reason to stare at, you grab it, with both hands. Like a road block, some aged lady jumping in to cross the road, some ass perspiring with that awful U-turn gone terribly wrong and you turn on that ‘Oh!-Great-now-what’ look!
But if you were to be a little considerate, the expression on the other side simply dissolves into something similar. But very few do that.
I always wondered why we are mentally dressed to pick a fight while we drive. We all have that serious ‘how-dare-you’ look and do not miss an opportunity to honk our attitude on the roads. Still, have you noticed sometimes, people have that earnest pleading can-I-cross look? You grin, they smile back in genuine gratitude. It is more usually when someone wants a favor like to allow him to cross into his lane but there is whole queue of vehicles…
Is there a reason why there is more of ‘Drive’ and less of ‘Let Drive’?
I think we are all in this mad race to get somewhere. And we cannot stand someone messing it up for us on the ‘transit’. I mean, from home (destination A) to office or somewhere (Destination B) is a time period that we do not count. We may have this estimated transit time of , say, 15 mts. We think that period is not ‘living’. It is to be saved and not wasted ‘driving’, something to be commuted in ‘zero time’. So we try to cover it in 10 mts, maybe to we start ‘living’ that extra 5 mts in destination B. And what if it is shoots 15 mts? We start to curse no matter we see..
Or maybe, and I sometimes wonder, it is an after effect of the ‘ragging’ we received when we were underdogs ourselves on those initial days of driving. All the mess we see around we attribute to some jackass who is learning to drive. You see no one forgiving anyone.
Nowadays, if someone takes liberties on the road, I get pleasantly amused. I never do that all too familiar hands-out-of the-window asking “what the hell?”… I know crossing the yellow line is trespassing but honestly, those yellow lines are only recommendations. If someone has some good reason, even smart driving, , I would rather oblige.
But if you can, while taking such liberties ( not those wild ones I mean) , raise your palm on the steering wheel as if to apologize, match it with considerate face, you will be surprised to find that it does neutralize everything. That’s the beauty of it.
Everything dissolves the moment you take the initiative to apologize and acknowledge your fault. And everyone, almost everyone, accepts such an apology with a smile. At least not that stare or the hand-out-of-the-window thing. It is when you we take without asking, like for granted, people get ruffled.
Drive and Let Drive.
I have come to notice, many a times that, if you can let others have their way, in driving, things look a lot better. That way, we all get home sooner and with a lot less BP.
When you are driving, you invariably search the opposite faces for their expression. It could be that of car driver or scooter or someone crossing or a policeman. And very often, you notice, if someone gives you a reason to stare at, you grab it, with both hands. Like a road block, some aged lady jumping in to cross the road, some ass perspiring with that awful U-turn gone terribly wrong and you turn on that ‘Oh!-Great-now-what’ look!
But if you were to be a little considerate, the expression on the other side simply dissolves into something similar. But very few do that.
I always wondered why we are mentally dressed to pick a fight while we drive. We all have that serious ‘how-dare-you’ look and do not miss an opportunity to honk our attitude on the roads. Still, have you noticed sometimes, people have that earnest pleading can-I-cross look? You grin, they smile back in genuine gratitude. It is more usually when someone wants a favor like to allow him to cross into his lane but there is whole queue of vehicles…
Is there a reason why there is more of ‘Drive’ and less of ‘Let Drive’?
I think we are all in this mad race to get somewhere. And we cannot stand someone messing it up for us on the ‘transit’. I mean, from home (destination A) to office or somewhere (Destination B) is a time period that we do not count. We may have this estimated transit time of , say, 15 mts. We think that period is not ‘living’. It is to be saved and not wasted ‘driving’, something to be commuted in ‘zero time’. So we try to cover it in 10 mts, maybe to we start ‘living’ that extra 5 mts in destination B. And what if it is shoots 15 mts? We start to curse no matter we see..
Or maybe, and I sometimes wonder, it is an after effect of the ‘ragging’ we received when we were underdogs ourselves on those initial days of driving. All the mess we see around we attribute to some jackass who is learning to drive. You see no one forgiving anyone.
Nowadays, if someone takes liberties on the road, I get pleasantly amused. I never do that all too familiar hands-out-of the-window asking “what the hell?”… I know crossing the yellow line is trespassing but honestly, those yellow lines are only recommendations. If someone has some good reason, even smart driving, , I would rather oblige.
But if you can, while taking such liberties ( not those wild ones I mean) , raise your palm on the steering wheel as if to apologize, match it with considerate face, you will be surprised to find that it does neutralize everything. That’s the beauty of it.
Everything dissolves the moment you take the initiative to apologize and acknowledge your fault. And everyone, almost everyone, accepts such an apology with a smile. At least not that stare or the hand-out-of-the-window thing. It is when you we take without asking, like for granted, people get ruffled.
Drive and Let Drive.
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