Isolation
Driving to work one day I found myself in one of those uniquely American experience of being stuck behind someone going just a hair over the speed limit in the fast lane. This doesn’t tend to happen in Europe, where people seem to understand that it’d not OK to drive in the passing lane, but it has become the norm here. The attitude here ostensibly is “hey, if you want to go faster that’s your problem, I got here first.” On this day I was also boxed in on the right by someone going nearly the same speed. Thus, I couldn’t go the speed I wanted (14 mph over) in the passing lane, and due to the responsible driver on my right, I could not pass that way either. So I did what I always do in these situation. I got uncomfortably close to the car in front of me. I kept my speed up until I was almost touching his bumper (for why I did this, and mind you I was not late, see the ranting on speeding—subsection The Efficiency Obsessed). I rode his ass for a good three minutes, before I realized he was not simply traveling the same highway I was traveling, he was going to be traveling all the same roads I was traveling. He was going to be taking the same exit, turning left onto the same main road, then right onto the same side street then left again onto our access road, then he was going to park in the same parking lot and would be going to his office on the top floor in my building where he is the Vice President of Finance. We’ve never spoken of it, but lets just say that the contracts I manage have come under closer monetary scrutiny then they otherwise might have. What was my mistake here? Well, for starters I was speeding, and then I became aggressive, but real mistake I made here was succumbing to the sense of anonymity I felt in my car. I saw him as one more car in my way, not the person responsible for the financial well being of my company, not to mention family and countless others.
We’re like that on the phone too. We talk to people on the phone in ways we would never talk to people in a face to face situation. This is because, for the most part, we are anonymous on the phone. Or at least we have the sense that we’re not going to have a personal relationship with the person on the other end of the line when we hang up. It seems somehow reasonable to raise our voices to the Verizon operator when she tells us that the reason our DSL service is out is due to the fact that they never received our payment, even though we’re sure we sent it in on time. We talk to her like she is stupid. If she were our neighbor and we had to go to her house to make the complaint, I can assure you that the conversation (though maybe not the outcome) would have a completely different feel to it. But we’re not in her house, in fact we may not even be in the same country. We have no idea where she is, what she looks like, how her day has been before our call, or how it will be when she goes home at night. We are one more caller on the end of the line and she’s a faceless, soulless, drone. What if she was your daughter, would you talk to her like that? Let me assure you, she is someone’s daughter.
On the road someone cuts in front of you and starts driving like they’ve got no where to be but in your way. It’s so easy to get mad and honk your horn, or give someone who cuts you off the finger. It’s a rare person the will give someone the finger face to face, but it seems almost the thing to do when you’re in a car. If you had to stop and talk to that person, you might realize they didn’t mean to cut you off, or that they weren’t even aware they had done it. I’m sure they would be sorry, but their car wronged your car and you stand up for it in an overzealous manner because you know (or believe) you won’t have to ever see this person again.
Every now and again road-rage takes a new level and people get out of their cars and fight it out, and this is preferable to making obscene gestures and shouting idol threats; at least it’s honest. Two men leave the confines of their cars to face each other and cease to be anonymous. But they are still acting like they’ll never see each other again. You wouldn’t fight the VP of Finance, would you? At least not over a difference in driving philosophies.
Cars, by design, make us mobile. They put a lot of people in the same place at the same time who wouldn’t otherwise be in the same place at the same time. Its kind of remarkable when you think about it. The person you are passing has had a completely different set of circumstances in their day which led them to this point. You and he came from different places at probably different times, and have a different destination, but for a moment, you are occupying nearly the exact same piece of the world. Now you’ve passed him and your cars will continue on their distinct trajectories, but for just a moment, your days met. We don’t think of that as special because it happens all the time, but it is kind of special when you stop to think about it. The statistics behind two random people meeting up to occupy the same ten foot radius of the world at a given time on a given day are astronomical, but again, it happens all the time we just don’t acknowledge it.
As I get closer to work, like one or two streets away, I am more conscious of my driving style. I don’t tailgate, I watch my speed in the turns, and I even use my blinker sometimes. This has nothing to do with the stretch of road, it has to do with the fact that soon I’m going to get out of my car and be Pete Mitchell again. I know that in the not too distant future I might happen into people who were also in their cars on that same stretch of road, with whom I have relationships. I work with people who do not do this, and I must say I’m offended sometimes. Why? They drive just as recklessly as I do, but somehow it’s personal. Larry peels out of the parking lot and goes forty miles an hour up the access road. That seems reckless, since he’s breaking the rules of courtesy, and besides we got that email from John asking us to drive twenty-five mph on the access road. Why does Larry think he can drive forty? Well, Larry, for all his driving shortcomings has integrity. He drives like he drives regardless of who might be watching, and from a certain perspective, that’s admirable. Now even more admirable is probably Peter, who drives according to the rules regardless of who is watching, but Larry is still a little closer to the solution than the rest of us. Actually there is no one named Peter at our company, we do however have a Larry. I can’t really tell if Peter drives that way when no one is watching, but I’m betting there are at least some Peters out there.
So here’s the key to it. Drive like you want to drive, and as the circumstances dictate but when you have a meeting with another automobile try to remember that there is a person in the other car. He’s had some life experiences that might surprise you. He has his own set of realities and will eventually get out of his car and cease to become anonymous in his own world. Try to imagine that you are in his world, since in fact you currently are, and give him the benefit of the doubt. Imagine how you would treat him if you knew each other, and treat him accordingly. In short; drive like you’re behind the VP of Finance.
