LEE DRESSELHAUS

Mad driver disease makes road warriors out of practically all of us

So..I wonder what makes people think its okay to shoot someone who passes them on the interstate? What happens to our brain when some gumby idiot gets too close behind us? Something does, that’s for sure, and it changes the parameters within which we operate as relatively rational, normal adults. We become frustrated, glancing over and over again into our rear-view mirrors and saying, look at THIS idiot, as they tailgate us at 80, leaving no room for error. Then, as our anger builds, we look again. The driver of the car that is exactly one foot behind us is talking on a cell phone. Or putting on make-up. Or reading a map. Or doing something else that just causes our blood pressure to start climbing because, hey, we wouldn’t do that, would we? Then, being the rational people we are, we decide to let this moron pass before his deliberate and rude inattentiveness kills us all. We’ll make the supreme sacrifice of pulling into the right lane, surrendering what was just a few moments before our rightful place on the highway to somebody we don’t know, an intruder into our personal space. So, begrudgingly, we do. We pull over. The fool who was tailgating us then passes, chatting merrily away on their cell phone or changing the CD in their player or whatever, and completely ignore the fact that they have managed to disrupt our lives. We watch angrily as they pass, blissfully ignoring the fact that we are glaring at them. Now, that’s really rude. They don’t even have the courtesy to look at us as they pass so we can express our displeasure with a stern look and maybe, just maybe, a shake of our head to show our disapproval of them, their car, and the fact that they obviously got their driver’s license through fraudulent means. If they have one at all, that is. Which we doubt. They slide past us and we breathe a sigh of relief as we watch them go. Good riddance, we think, then settle down back into our slightly relaxed and maybe even lethargically mellow state of mind that we can achieve when driving. Then they do the unthinkable. As soon as they pass us, they turn into the lane just ahead and SLOW DOWN as they fumble for something else to distract them from driving. Oh, now, we think as our hands tighten on the steering wheel and our blood pressure spikes. This is too much. Now we’re mad. And we’re getting into the “I’ll show YOU, pal,” state of mind. We whip our car back into the left lane and pass the idiot who just passed us. This time we do more than glare. We’ve lost any sense of maturity and decorum we possessed just a few short moments before. As our car pulls even with his we lean forward and slightly toward the man who represents all that is evil in our society and we give him a wave. You know, THAT wave. The al-expressive, universally understood wave that doesn’t involve all our fingers. And we make damn sure he sees it this time. There. We told him. That moron. Satisfied now that we’ve expressed ourselves to this monster, we begin to pull away. But wait! This guy is waving back with gusto using the same number of fingers! And he looks mad. WHAT? What did we do to deserve that? Doesn’t he understand that we were chastising him for being an irresponsible road hog who just completely interfered with our driving karma? And now HE’S mad? How dare he! And now, we find ourselves locked in a macho contest of wills. He passes us, waves. We pass him, wave back. We will not, must not submit to this sociopath. He is obviously deranged, and even more obviously the worst kind a person. Not only is he a road hog, he is probably a criminal pervert psychopath who deserves to be punished and by golly, we’re just the man to do it! Yessir, he picked the wrong guy to mess with this time. We become the Road Warrior. He must not win. He pulls ahead after one final, emphatic wave and takes an exit from the interstate. Oh, no. He’s not getting away that easily. We follow, and when he stops at a red signal we leave our car and we come face to face with pure evil. He passed us. He must die. So, we remember the gun we keep in the car for protection. We were never really sure about what it would protect us from, but now we know. And we take it with us to confront the creature. And we shoot a 35-year-old accountant, husband, and father of three. Not a monster at all. Just a guy. Because he angered us on the interstate. I have a message for all you folks out there who have found themselves in a situation like this n with or without shots fired. Like those two guys recently on I-10 for instance. Get a grip. And grow up. LEE DRESSELHAUS writes this column every Wednesday for L’Observateur.