Mental Patience

Man, I’ve become an impatient son of a bitch over the last few years.    I was reminded of this yesterday while seated in the back seat of my brother’s car as he drove down the highway, cursing at the slow moving car in front of him.

“C’mon! What is it with all the slow idiots in Atlanta?  HURRY UP!!!”  he shouted.

I laughed, because he was totally overreacting to what was a very minor situation, and because he was totally overreacting MUCH less than I would have been were I the one behind the wheel.  Oh yeah, man, if I were driving, I would have been unleashing the harshest, vilest tirade at that slow-driving bastard that my words alone would kill small animals on the side of the road.  I would have used every curse word in the book, would have thrown every form of insult I could come up with, would have found every possible way to use the Lord’s name in vein to express my absolute horror at having to casually put my foot on the brake and decelerate at a slow comfortable pace.

The nerve of that guy!  That… fucker… going…  GOING….  SLOW!!!

I have become an extraordinarily impatient person.   And have become an extraordinarily unpleasant person with whom to share a car trip.   I suffer from an immense inhuman form of road rage.   I’ll be driving down a quiet two-lane road, minding my own business, narcissistically day-dreaming about myself, not paying attention to the road, when some dude will pull out in front of me and accelerate to a speed that is maybe 2 or 3 miles per hour slower than I would like to be going…. And my blood will begin to boil.  I’ll feel the fury growing.   And I will pull up as close to the guy’s back bumper as I can, to rudely demonstrate the exasperated state that this evil stranger has put me in.  And in my mind the panic will grow and grow…  “Oh my God.  Oh my God.   Holy shit.  What the hell is this?  What is he doing?  What the hell is he doing?  Oh my God…”   And I’ll repeat these thoughts over and over, making myself angrier and angrier as my fingers clench the steering wheel so tightly that there’s no longer blood flowing to them,  and I’ll lean forward over the wheel, my big nose practically touching the windshield, as if sheer will alone will push the bastard forward… And then I’ll think, “Oh man…  you bastard… I’m gonna smoke you, you son of a bitch.  I’m about to smoke you!”  And then I’ll whip into the next lane, smash my foot down on the gas, whip around the guy, pull in front of him even though the lane I was just in was completely empty, and I’ll race away, thinking, “Oh my God!  What was that?? What was he doing?  You son of a bitch, take a look at my car’s ass!  Take a look at my car’s ass!  I’m out of here!”   I’ll roar down the road, leaving the fiddle-farting sunday driver to putter along in my exhaust.

In the arena of full disclosure, when I use phrases like “whip around the guy,” “race away,” and “roar down the road,”  I’m taking a bit of poetic license.  Actually, I’m totally lying.  I drive a Honda Civic.   And not one of those hilarious souped-up ones.  Just a dumb old Honda Civic.  These things don’t go fast.  There’s no “whipping” around another car in a Honda Civic.  And I don’t even drive fast anyway.  I hate driving.  In fact, the car-passing scene that I described above, from being stuck behind a car to speeding out in front of it, probably takes in its entirety… oh… about 10 minutes.   If you can imagine a dumb gray little sedan slowly going around  another sedan, the driver in one car steaming with rage, the guy in the other car not even aware that he’s being passed, then you’ll have a pretty good idea of how pathetic this whole situation really is.

But I can’t help it. I can’t suppress the rage.  I just cannot stand getting stuck behind another car.   I’m just another asshole on the road, really.

And it’s not limited to the road.  I get this angry when I’m stuck walking behind a slow person.   And in a hallway?  Oh my.  Oh my dear, it’s unbearable.  Absolutely unbearable.  Unlike driving, when it comes to walking, I actually do move pretty fast.  Especially at work, where I’m in a near constant state of unwarranted stress and caffeine-fueled anxiety, I just burn down the hallways!  Like a cat who will be lying peaceful on the rug one second, and then will be tearing out of the room the next, I’ll jump up from my cube without thought or warning to scurry down the hall to go share some information that, well, really would have been fine to just pass along in an email.  And as I’m hauling ass down the hall, I’ll often see a pair of employees walking slowly up ahead, chatting, oblivious to the frantic speed-walking maniac who’s quickly cutting the distance between himself and them, and will soon find himself stuck behind them. Trapped.  Afraid of being impolite, I won’t bother trying to squeeze past.  Instead, I’ll rapidly decelerate to a normal, unbearable, pace, and walk closely behind them, and will think to myself, “Oh my God.  No… No!   This is horrible.  This is absolutely horrible…  PLEASE… PLEASE HURRY THE HELL UP… YOU EVIL EVIL IDIOTS! “   I really do.

And should I find myself behind some clueless schlub waddling down the hallways while typing into his Blackberry….  um, well, I can’t repeat what is going through my head.   It would melt your monitor.

Now, here’s where it gets really stupid.  I’m not impatient because I have some false sense that I’m accomplishing any sense of efficiency whatsoever.  I’m logical enough to know that when I race around a car in front of me on the road, I’m not getting to my destination any quicker than the guy I’ve rudely passed by.   In fact, as soon as I get around him, I’ll inevitably find myself stuck at a red light, and that slow ass dork is just going to putt right up next to me, adding even more insult to the already excruciating situation.   And as for the hallway, well, crap, man, the office hallways aren’t even long enough that increased speed is going to make any difference.  Walk or run, you’re still going to get to the end of the hallway in about the same amount of time.   You could plop down on your ass and pull yourself forward with your toes, and you’re still going to get to the finish line in roughly the same amount of time as I will.   In fact, I think it’s fair to say that, with all the energy I’ve exerted in the past five years trying to get around the slow person in front of me – in both the road and the hallways – I’ve probably saved about… oh, I don’t know… twelve seconds.  It’s really a pretty futile exercise, I’ll admit.

So if not for efficiency, then why?  I’ll tell you.  It’s lack of control.  No, I don’t mean lack of mental and emotional control (although this is most definitely a symptom).  No, it’s the control that the person in front holds over me.  When I’m stuck behind someone, I’m no longer cruising along at the speed which I’ve decided upon.  I’m now stuck moving at the speed which the person in front has decided upon.  I am now being controlled by the person in front of me.  And it drives me absolutely crazy.  This stranger, this asshole, is making decisions for me!   Without my permission!   Who in the hell does he think he is?  I don’t remember signing any contract. I don’t remember any handshakes.  Hell no I didn’t agree to this. Yet here I am, a slave.  The person in front, in his whimsical slow driving/walking, has suddenly wrestled control of my forward progress and is now 100% in charge of the situation.  And it makes me nuts.  I was just cruising along, doing my thing, and now this asshole gets in the lead, and I’m forced to do his thing.  And it drives me bonkers, man.   Bonkers, damnit.  Bonkers!

I do believe that this is just another quality that has formed from my living alone for the past few years.  I’ve gotten so used to being able to do what I want when I want, than when I’m forced to make even the slightest sacrifice, I’m completely put off.  What?  I have to do what?  I have to slow down?  I never said I wanted to slow down!  You don’t own me!!!

Is that weird?  I don’t think so. I think that it’s probably more closely aligned to why most folks are impatient.  It’s not lack of time, it’s lack of control.  We humans do hate that lack of control, don’t we?  I think most of us are often stuck in that mindset of the angry, horny teen yelling at his parents:  DON’T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!

Or maybe it’s just me.  That’s fine.  I think I can live with that.  But maybe you can help me with this.   If you happen to be mosing along, driving down down a quiet street, and you see a  stupid Honda Civic come up behind you…. please, just get out of the way.  The guy behind you ain’t stable, man.

Please.