Road Rage

Recently, my job has found me driving from my main office in Bethesda, MD to the General Services Administration’s regional office occasionally. Now I know that just the mention as something as exciting as the General Services Administration has got you salivating for a thrilling post, but I regret to inform you that this post has nothing to do with the GSA except that it is located in DC. Usually I get there quickly without too much traffic getting in the way. Yesterday, however, on the George Washington Parkway before the 395N exit I found myself in quite a bit of bumper to bumper.

Despite being from New Jersey, I am usually a pretty courteous driver. As I was in the queue to get onto 395, if someone tried to get over into my lane, I would usually let them in. Over the course of about 15 minutes I let 3 or 4 cars in front of me. Now I have better things to do than worry about what effect that will have on my total travel time, but I can’t imagine that it was much more than a 30 second difference. Apparently the man in the car behind me did not have better things to do with his time, and became increasingly infuriated with me for allowing people to ‘cut’ him.

I was blissfully ignorant of his anger until he started honking at me at which point I looked in my rear view mirror to see what looked to be a older, very bald, very red man, in a Buick gesturing violently and talking to someone, despite being alone in the car. Being as I am still not used to taking pictures of these sorts of things, I forgot. Instead an artist’s rendering of him can be seen below.



I looked and laughed at this guy for a while, only to notice that there was a new person trying to cut infront of me. This guy had gotten my attention with his hand and was being very courteous, not getting too close to my car or anything. This put me in a tough position; I could either be mean to the nice guy trying to get into my lane, or risk being killed in a fit of road rage by the angry geriatric behind me.

I chose both. I edged forward as if I were not going to let the man in, watching the face of my furious follower calm; then stopped dead and waved on my new friend. My new archenemy behind me exploded in a fit of gesturing and honking that gave him the appearance of conducting the crescendo of an intense orchestral piece.

I’m sure this fit of rage shortened Buick-man’s life expectancy significantly. That said, it couldn’t have been too much longer anyway. I am now stating my Car Related Assertion of the Week (CRAW): No one younger than 50 drives a Buick by choice. They are cars exclusively for old people, and if you drive one, you are either old, very old, or know so little about cars that you didn’t know you should sell it when you inherited it from your grandfather when he died. That brings me to something that might extend your life, my second Public Service Announcement: Chill out in Traffic, life is stressful enough without worrying about whether you’re adding 10 seconds to your commute every time someone goes in front of you.

-CLDC