Road Rage Can Be Self-Inflicted

Next to the weather the one thing you can bring up in conversation that will result in feedback is driving and roads.  When it comes to drivers today you can break them into two categories…those in a hurry and those who are not.

I admit that most times I would fall into the category of being in a hurry as it always seems like I’m racing against the clock to get somewhere.  Most of the time it’s my fault because I did not leave enough time to get from point A to point B.

Often though outside factors like traffic put you behind schedule and may result in desperate measures to make up that time and get to where you need to be.  That is when you seem to run into the driver who is in no rush to get anywhere.  You get behind him/her and your blood pressure starts building as they are limping along at 5 or 10 miles below the speed limit.  Let’s be honest…they are not doing anything wrong but you (or me) start screaming at them to pull over or get off the road as you keep looking at the clock and realize there is no way you are getting to your destination on time.

Of course this can lead to road rage because you are now taking your frustration out on the slower driver for what’s really your problem.  Listen this really comes down to the fact that most of us are time-challenged and if it takes 20 minutes to get somewhere we plan on 20 or even a few minutes less.  So when you get behind that slow driver in a non-passing zone you quickly make them out to be the bad guy.

In full disclosure this scenario is more prevalent in an area like ours where they are many elderly drivers on the road, some who should no longer be behind the wheel. However as long as they are we need to co-exist and maybe at the end of the day the simple solution is respect and courtesy.  Of course I could make the case that’s the solution to most of our problems but I’ll leave that for another day.