TURNING INTO OTHERS AS BEING "TURNED IN ON SELF"...

If blogs are the new collective way for us to publicly rant away our frustration/stress level then I may grow to love this after all. For tonight I find myself turning to what must be my (and many others) primary form of daily stress … that being life in traffic. My biggest problem – or so my therapist would suggest – is that I don’t really experience being cut off or held up as just a simple “one off” event. No for me (or my so called brain) each occurrence becomes another tile in the mosaic of all that is wrong with society and the universe. Crazy eh????

But you know quite frankly, I do have to argue that -- give or take -- I do have a bit of a point. Among the things that I find the most frustrating are the many ways human self-centredness shows itself so quickly in the ways that people act in traffic. Indeed apart from making sure that they don’t get hit by others, I wonder if people ever consider what others may be about or need as they make their way down the road. I mean sure, some may want to drive 10 or 15 kms below the speed limit because you feel safer but do they ever consider the fact that the person behind them may not be tailgating because they want to but rather because they have been called home by a frustrated wife or frightened child and are legitimately in a rush. Don’t even get me started on the “going slow in the fast lane” thing. I would like to remind folks that having a right to do something doesn’t make it right to do it – in any context.

For me there seems to be a rather sad sense that people feel that whatever is behind them doesn’t matter.

Now to be sure, I do have to admit that I drive too fast too often and I am easily frustrated. So too, I am well aware that the level that I get choked is – in a self-convicting form -- just more proof of what I’m saying. At the same time, it does seem that the enclosure of the car rather inappropriately frees people to feel that they are alone and/or primary in the world. As a Lutheran who thinks Martin was profoundly ahead of his time when he defined sin as being “curved in on yourself” I think our collective attitudes as drivers on the road (my own included obviously) is the perfect proof of how right he was.

Now clearly, I know I am not alone in my angst and that this is probably one of the most common water-cooler topics. That said, it is never a small thing to reminder ourselves that among the most critical moral-ethical learning tasks for every human being (Christian or not) is to learn they are NOT the centre of the universe. So too, as petty as much of this can seem most days, the fact is that it kills people – LITERALLY.

I once heard that a pastor friend of mine suggested that the most important piece of advice he could give a couple is “above all be at least kind”. I wonder what would happen if that became the most important rule of the road?!?!?