life in the slow lane

Commuting is slowly killing me. Okay, I might be exaggerating a bit, but it is driving me crazy, pun intended.

I have an hour’s drive each way to work, thankfully only a few days a week. But, it’s starting to become torturous. It’s not the traffic I mind. I have pretty much figured out the best route coming and going and the best and worst times to do either. If I do somehow end up in rush hour at 5:15 p.m., I know that I can plan on an extra 20 minutes to my commute. Not usually a problem. Crank the radio or call a cousin (now that I have a hands-free attachment to the phone.)

What is so painful is when I keep getting stuck behind slow drivers.

Keep in mind that I rarely drive faster than 60 mph, mainly because I’m not punching a clock, but also because Don Shelby assured me that it helps with gas mileage. It just doesn’t help so much with all the angry people forced to pass me as I drive the speed limit in the right lane.

You’d think I’d have a little grace then for the idiots driving too slow down roads that aren’t multi-laned. Nope.

I don’t even mind so much if they’re at least driving the speed limit. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve got stuck behind someone who either appears to not know where they’re going or isn’t paying attention to the line of 14 cars behind them or simply has nothing better to do than drive 44 miles an hour on a road with very minimal passing opportunities.

Just the other day, I was stuck behind someone from a very small town (I’m assuming that because the vehicle had an identifying dealership logo on it) who was tottering down the road in a late-model Suburu station wagon, travelling at the great rate of 42 mile an hour. Every once in awhile we peaked at 43. This went on for at least 12 miles before I finally was able to pass without breaking any MN laws.

I blasted my horn and was disgusted to see, no surprise here, it was a woman driver, perhaps mid-50s. And she had a male passenger. I wondered why he wasn’t driving. My guess is he might have been just as frustrated as me.

I hate to put females down, since I am one, but so many are such bad drivers. Or maybe bad drivers isn’t quite accurate. They’re not bad drivers in the sense that they drive recklessly or agressively; they simply drive stupidly. Or slowly. Or overly cautiously.

It is so frustrating to have only two real good ways in and out of the cities and both roads are single lane, leaving you at the mercy of someone on a Sunday drive on Tuesday afternoon.

I’m not trying to pass myself off as the world’s best female driver, because I sometimes pull out in front of other cars when I should have waited. I sometimes switch lanes and miss a vehicle in my blind spot. And sometimes I irritate people because I’m only driving 60 in a 55 mph zone and they want to go faster. Sometimes, I will increase the cruise control just a bit to make them less upset with me; other times I figure I’m already speeding and I’m not going to take the chance of wasting more than $100 on a speeding ticket.

But, still I know I don't upset that many people, nor am I the stereotypical female driver. Nor do I drive so slow that I have half a dozen or more people behind me who are mad enough to commit murder.

I'm not excusing road rage, but I can at least understand it. Especially when the anger is being caused by someone's lack of driving ability.

I believe there is a lane for slow drivers - it's called the shoulder.