anger management

it is hard to bike around the city and not run into some form of ANGER. it is another traffic hazard that I have to be keenly aware of as I am aware of car doors.

sometimes the source is ME. a car cuts me off, a biker does something stupid, a scooter rides in the bike lane flooding my lungs with Taipei nostalgia. it can be overwhelming and all consuming and i can spend the whole ride fuming to myself, replaying the whole little scene over and over and over... i try to recognize it, get over it, focus back on the road.

sometimes i see other people explode. and i know i don't want to be like that. one guy the other day, a truck driver, a water delivery dude, had a handcart sitting out next to his truck on market street. bikers were forced to go out into the middle lane, worse we had to cross the MUNI tracks which is always dangerous, i'd seen a guy go down on them just a day earlier. a woman asked him to move the hand cart.

maybe it had been slightly impolite, but she did not yell. he did. "FUCK YOU. WHERE THE GODDAMN HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO PUT IT," he said in the loudest nastiest voice I could possibly imagine. there was no room for any discussion in it. the bikers just continued to ride on by.

another explosion occured on Valencia street, this a car on car thing. a woman pulled out of a parking space near a traffic light as the light turned green. she cut off a guy, and he went nuts, gunning his engine to get abreast of her, not letting her completely cut him off, yelling all the while. they caught up to the car in front and then a light, and they all began yelling at each other about not being able to drive.

another example was on folsom street when a biker was in the middle of the right lane as the light turned green. bikers do it to let cars turn right. in this case a pickup truck was behing him, and he was furious at being slowed down honking and gunning his engine to get around him. half a block later we were passing him as he had to stop behind traffic. instead of shame or chagrin though, he flipped a bird in the rear window of his pickup as well passed, not daring to look at us though.

a final example is when i tried to inform a driver that their lights were not on. I kept pointing at the front of his car and he kept shooting past me flipping me off. finally, he pulled over to let someone off and I stopped to tell him. instead of listening he opened his door and flung it at me. i left, pointing one last time at his light. he flipped me off AGAIN as he passed me. when he finally turned on his lights he ignored me.

what is it about cars, bikes and roads that drives us to such excess anger? i don't like it.