There and Back Again

I always said, not so originally perhaps, that driving in Washington, DC was simply a matter of survival and everyone was playing at the same game. You don't really want to let that black sedan in, but you do. The white Suburban behind you didn't want to let you in either. But you got in. Everyone's bumpers and grills were flecked with paint from everyone else's bumpers and grills.

Funny the things I would shrug off while I was driver in Washington. In the Beltway, drivers pull all kinds of stunts because they are elbowing their way into traffic or jostling for parking spaces. Never mind. As long as your car fits between you and the next car or you and the sidewalk, you maneuver around them. If not, you honk or shake your latte in annoyance.

I know all of this and yet when a dawdling 2C driver wanders into my lane or veers in front of me or stops traffic in two lanes to signal his way into a parking space, I am enraged. I have no other but a woman's reason...

But I can still parallel park like a champ. And never try to outhandle me in the Mini Cooper.