Good neighbours make for more harmonious roads
A dialogue between drivers takes place on our roads, and it’s often caustic and fraught with anger. We can wield our cars like weapons — or shields — with the latent bully in too many of us grabbing the wheel. Maybe it’s all the congestion we face or the heat, or maybe it’s the expectation of negative outcomes from bad responses. Anyone driving faster than me is reckless; anyone driving slower is a fool. Driving is too interactive not to make quick judgments, because my safety depends on your predictability.
Every fall, in late October, I drive down to Keene, New Hampshire. There is also something great about driving alone for eight hours at a time with little traffic and less obligation.
On the return trip a few years ago, the roadway was bare. Wide open spaces that swirled through New Hampshire and Vermont, encouraging a heavy right foot, because who could resist?
In time, I noticed two other cars experiencing what I convinced myself must be the same seductive force.For two memorable hours, we choreographed an unspoken dance. Keeping each other within sight, we took turns spending ten or fifteen minutes out front, setting a pace that allowed all of us to tick up the speed within bounds of the conditions but above those rigidly posted. Sparsely populated freeways tend to see fewer police. We shared the risk until we parted ways, a nod to competent drivers.
I’ve remembered that afternoon because it was a rarity. In the muddled mess of construction and congestion I encounter heading north in Ontario, it’s the opposite. When you spend several hours on the same stretch of road as other cars, you get to know each other, no matter how hard you pretend not to. You can speed up to cut in front of me as a lane reduction looms, but if we’ve been side by side for an hour, we will be beside each other again. I know this and I’m going to let you in; we don’t have to make eye contact to be courteous, and we don’t have to make eye contact to see each other, either.
Clusters of cars on long trips are temporary neighbourhoods. Maybe your stick figure family tells me a lot about you; maybe it’s the bikes and kayaks you’ve tied on board. What you’re hauling — or not — separates the cottagers from the campers and the commuters from the tourists. I can tell if you’re lost; you can tell if I’m late.
I know if you’re angry, like one Honda Odyssey driver I shared a couple of hours with recently. You didn’t want anyone ahead of you, but speeding up only to slow down just tops up your anger. While the rest of us had settled into the heavy, though steady, summer traffic, you couldn’t seem to pull away nor drop back. The rest of the neighbours were getting along, but not you. You had kids in the back, and I wondered if you thought about what you were teaching them. This is one lesson I learned from my Dad that I haven’t forgotten.
I pulled over for a coffee, Mr. Odyssey. Stressing over your stress would be like setting my next-door neighbour’s fence on fire.
For better or worse, as go the drivers, so goes the neighbourhood.