Considerate Recklessness or Rudely Considerate?

Writing about traffic, or driving stories is lame.

But I have to vent and rant.

I was driving down past Liberty Square Apartments with my friend Jessica the other day. We were following a black SUV and we were not following too closely. As we neared 500 North, the black SUV slammed on their brakes to a complete stop in the middle of the road. I am not the nicest driver, but sometimes, I wait and try to understand what's going on before I react. I did that in this case. I looked for a old lady with a cane walking across the street, or maybe a lost dog darting into the road or maybe someone was having a heart attack in the car; but there was no life-threatening or even important reason to brake unexpectedly. The driver of the black SUV stopped rapidly in the middle of the road to say hey to a couple friends unloading their car on the side of the road.

Once this came into realization, I reacted. I put my hands up in frustration and the friends of the black SUV started giving me scowling looks like I was the one who slammed on my brakes in the middle of the road. One of them then mimicked me and I began to lose my cool. I rolled the window down and we exchanged words. The guy was defending his friend for abruptly stopping in the middle of a busy road. Some people might call this "good friendship," but I call it pompous stupidity.

Another thing that happens to me constantly is what I call being "rudely considerate," or "considerate recklessness." In Provo, Utah, people have this weird obligation to stop their cars in the middle of the road for random jaywalking pedestrians. I don't know if these Provoans know that their cars are much faster than the jaywalkers, but someone should really teach them driving etiquette. I'll be standing on the side of the road nowhere near a cross walk, and the only car in sight will slam on their brakes in the middle of the road so that I can walk across the street. Where's the logic in that?

I understand if you're driving through a parking lot and people are walking all over the place. You should yield to the people because a parking lot is really just a big boardwalk to a store from your car. The walkers have the right-of-way. And yes, I know pedestrians always have the right-of-way, but why do people stop their cars from going 40 mph down a road to stop dangerously in traffic's way to "be considerate?"

That is not being considerate. It's dangerous and annoying. But the worst part about it is when I don't stop, I look like a jerk. How twisted is that? I refuse to being a sitting duck on a dangerous road, and I get glared at. It's not really fair.

But if you've been to Utah, you probably don't have sympathy for me. You could probably out-do any bad driving story I have here. This is the home of all the self-righteous, every-member-a-traffic-officer drivers. I have never seen people pull out in front of me to try and get me to obey the speed limit until I moved here. It's amazing, in a bad way.

So I am a pioneer in this pioneer-founded state. I will continue to not stop in the middle of the road for jaywalkers, I will continue flashing my brights at the slow drivers driving in the fast lane and I will continue to use my blinkers to let everyone around me know what I am doing with this Honda Civic going 40 mph. Logic is not overrated.

Just a bit of short story stuff

Unglued (Relationship)

The speakers were creaking an electronic twitch. That meant his phone was receiving a text message. Not again.

He had been sitting at his desk for hours thinking about how to phrase his thoughts on the blank letter lying in front of him. He was the kind of person who absorbed the sounds and feelings of the night, but did not let them distract him from his task. He would sit in his uncomfortable, black chair and listen to soft, psychedelic rock while he tried to come up with the words that would make her understand.

Damn it. Another text message.

He knew it was her wondering where he was. She wanted to come over and get food, or watch some useless MTV reality show, or maybe sit by the fire and talk about their future kids and what kind of baby food we would get them. Was she serious?

He dreaded almost every minute of their relationship. He was not even attracted to her anymore. But why? He used to have fun with her. He used to adore her. During their partisan-emotional pow-wows, she would often pry into his subconscious. Her mining always seemed to circle back to the night of that one concert. That concert where he played eye tag with the lead singer of this indie, semi-pop band known as Emerly. Something about her made him lose all sense of commitment. He didn’t think she noticed, but she obviously did.

Was he displacing his love for his girlfriend for the lead singer of an only-decent band he saw once in concert? Probably not, but maybe. It didn’t matter anyway; he stopped loving her regardless of the reason, and now it was time to end things and move on.

He put the black Zebra ballpoint to the paper and wrote, “I’m sorry. You want the kids to eat chicken and carrot baby food when I want them to eat beef and beans. We should stop seeing each other.”

As he dotted the period at the end of the sentence, he chuckled. How could he not chuckle? That sentence was possibly the most ridiculous thing he had ever written without Ambien in his body. But somehow he knew it would make sense to her. He felt like that was the way she would communicate a breakup to him.

He leaned back in his decade-old chair. His desk was not balanced and it made him slightly dizzy when he noticed it. His Hispanic neighbors’ profanity came out of his window like someone from the future would appear out of a portal; completely unexpected and unnecessary. Then his eyes fixed on his vanilla scented candle. Few things distracted him like a small, dancing flame. He slipped away into another world like many people do on Monday mornings at work when the visions of the previous weekend take them away. This imaginary place was his sanctuary; and once he stepped onto solid ground of his imagination, he saw her. It was the girl from Emerly. The girl he couldn’t help but play eye tag with even while his girlfriend was glaring at him. She was singing his favorite song and looking directly into his blue eyes.

Why do you hold back?
Oceans never end
There’s plenty of slack
Look around you, flex and bend

It’s time to leave
Your surroundings are bleak
You can find an exit
Just look to me; you’re not weak

She was wearing a simple striped, dark blue Polo shirt with tight jeans. Her brunette hair was blowing in the wind. There is always a faint breeze in his daydreams. She had squinting eyes and perfectly straight, white teeth. The different parts of her face fit together in near-perfect harmony. Her skin was half as dark as a Greek’s, which made her look like she had just returned from a week in the Florida Keys everyday. She pulled the microphone close to her lush lips, and she sang deep and passionately. The speakers vibrated the entire room with her synthetic lyrics. Her eyes never left his. He did not want the song to end. But as the song faded out, she reached out her hand and said, “I need to tell you something.”

“Yes?” he anxiously asked.

“Can you keep a secret? This is something only you and I can know.”

“Yes, of course. What is it?” I asked.

Brrrrrr. The speakers blared with careless, static destruction. It was another text message. And of course, if must be her. Why doesn’t she just stop?

He leaned over his desk to finally look at his cell phone’s screen. 3 new text messages. He knew it was her. He would put a year’s worth of chicken and carrot baby food on it. The first message read: “Hey babe, call me! Let’s get some food and eat it by the fire.” The next message read: “Hey call me, we need to talk.” And the final message read: “We should see other people.”

For some reason, he did not jump up and celebrate like he would if the NCAA disposed of the BCS for a tournament style post-season. He felt a churning, burning sensation in the bottom half of his heart. He knew the problem had resolved itself, but somehow another slightly larger problem had made itself manifest. It’s hard to let a part of you and your past drown. He felt like he was sitting in a small boat that had a hole in it while crossing a vast lake. He used a bucket to empty as much water as he could, but the water continued to relentlessly board the boat. What can you do? He did not know.

As he thought about what he should do, his blue eyes caught the dancing nancy flickering on the wick and he flew away again. This time it wasn't to see the girl from Emerly; he appeared in his metaphoric boat on the vast lake. It was beautiful. And of course, there was a faint, lake breeze. But his hand was gripping something. What the he...? He looked down and saw a pole with an eight pound line and a hook with a squirmy worm on it. He smiled and cast. I love fishing, he thought. In the amount of time it takes to get bored watching golf, the line jerked. His instinct took over and he pulled in a fish. But once that fish was in his boat, he jumped to the opposite side of the boat causing the boat to almost capsize. That was not a fish.

It was a fish's body with his girlfriend's face. He was scared and confused, but more curious than anything as he creped toward the silver, scaly fish. When he got close enough to see the fish's personified face, he noticed she was crying. In that moment, he somehow bypassed the fact that his girlfriend had a fish's body, and he told her he was sorry. She said she was sorry, too. They talked for a little while and came to a good understanding. As the sun was saying good night, they were saying their goodbyes. He picked her up and lowered her into the lake. She immediately dove deep into the lake and out of polarized sight. As he sat in the boat, he had an epiphany...

Brrr. The speakers were crackling again. He jumped in his chair because the transition from that daydream was difficult. Is she texting me again? he thought, no longer feeling sympathetic towards their breakup. He looked at his cell phone once more expecting to see the words of his ex-girlfriend, but he was relieved to see it was not her. It was his friend informing him that Emerly was going to be having a show that weekend. He did not mind the speakers creaking this good news. He wondered how much the tickets would be, but it didn't matter; he loved seeing Emerly.