Let’s face it; some days words come to those who write, and then there are days when the well runs dry. I was out of ideas up until yesterday afternoon – absolutely nothing on tap in the grey matter. And then inspiration passed my way.
I was sitting in an intersection waiting to make a left turn. It was that “special” time of day when people are leaving their jobs and trying to get home, and there wasn’t a break in the traffic driving by me so I could make my turn. The only option was to sit there… and sit there… and sit some more… until the light started to cycle.
You know the drill. The light turns to yellow, people stop and then the car that’s hanging out in the intersection makes the turn just as the light turns to red. It would be nice to have a dedicated left-turn signal at this intersection, but in all reality it probably isn’t necessary except for the small window of time in the afternoon when the home-bound traffic is exiting a nearby government building and medical center.
So there I was waiting for a break in traffic (that, of course, never came) and the light finally started to change. Oh, goody! My chance at last! A truck drove through the light on the yellow, which I expected. After he cleared me, my chance would come. I was ready to crank the steering wheel and hit the gas just as the light turned red.
It was time to get my butt out of the intersection pronto! But much to my chagrin, another car drove straight through the red light as if it were still green. Allow me to make some instant enemies as I profile and stereotype; the driver was female. Ah, yes… the proverbial “woman driver”. Females were made fun of in the 40’s, 50’s and 60’s as being sub-par motor vehicle operators. And friends, I’m here to affirm that the stereotype is back with a vengeance today. The only reason this still holds true is because of the cell phone.
The woman drove through the intersection with her left hand holding a phone up against her left ear. My wife and I both watched as she drove through the intersection, neither looking for opposing traffic or even looking up at the light. She stared only at the bumper up ahead of her as she chattered away on the phone. She might as well have been wearing a pair of blinders, as her phone-induced tunnel vision had taken total control of her faculties.
As she rolled by I leaned on the horn and shook my fist (in a feeble attempt to convey the thought “wake the hell up”), but she never so much as looked up or turned her head. Most likely she never knew that she had just blown through a red light. Was the information on that phone call so important that she should be oblivious to her own safety, or that of others? Was the gossip that salacious that she should be blind to her own potential peril?
So why am I picking on women when everyone uses cell phones these days? Well… it seems that whenever we’re driving home after work and are approaching another car that is behaving erratically, it’s almost always being driven by a woman on a cell phone. As we pass the car, the phrase “it’s a #$%&*@$% woman on a #$% - #@%&%$ cell phone” fills the air. And guess what, all you would-be defenders against misogyny? I’m NOT the one making that statement. It’s the other person in the car with me: a woman!
Yes, even she is getting annoyed with the growing trend of inattentive driving due to people being so engrossed with chattering with their friends that they can’t pay attention to the business at hand: driving safely.
So what can be done to turn this trend around? Keep bitching about it! Shame your friends when they do it! (Shame on YOU if you do it – change should begin with you!) Just because we’ve mostly seen women driving with cell phones doesn’t mean that the men don’t do it too – and you guys need to knock it off as well.
It would be a shame to insist on government intervention to solve this problem, yet that might be the end game. If people can’t police themselves to drive responsibly, it might require legislation to babysit everybody. I’m envisioning a chip in every cell phone that can detect a running engine within a few feet of the phone, or an accelerated rate of motion faster than walking (or a combination of both) that will block the phone from ANY function other than dialing out to 911. This would kill ALL devices within a car, not just the driver’s. Is that what we really need?
In conclusion, if you haveto make a call… make it and end it before you start the car. Driving isn’t the time to “catch up” on anything. There are many of us out there that are sick and tired of having to be over-vigilant on the road watching out for cell phone toting morons who aren’t paying any attention to what’s going on past the conversation they’re having.
So, are you now asking, “Isn’t this mainly a bike and humor blog? This isn’t very funny!” You’re right; it isn’t. Let’s talk about bicycling for a brief moment. Cyclists are sometimes hard enough to see when you have to share a road. When your attention is wrapped up in a phone call, that “thump” you just heard was the cyclist you just clipped when you drifted just a little too far to the right.
And what about the people that can be seen riding their bike along with one hand on the handlebars and the other holding a cell phone against their ear? That form of stupidity deserves its own special topic – and this post has rambled on too long already!
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