Reflection: Misreading the Signs

One of the vexing aspects of driving in general and city driving in particular is that it requires split-second decisions.

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You have to quickly determine right and wrong, friend and foe, danger and safe. Sometimes you get it wrong.

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While in motion, you must quickly assess the situation.

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Is that a parking spot? ?Is that pedestrian paying attention? ?Can I make the light? Sometimes you get it wrong.

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This morning I was getting it wrong.

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I’m in midtown, and I turn off 3rd avenue onto a side street.

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There are two lanes of one-way traffic. And the cab driver in front of me gets in the middle of the two lanes, and stops

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This makes no sense. There is nothing stopping him from pulling to one side or the other. It’s annoying.

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I wait a second to see if I’m missing something.

I honk gently while feeling less gentle in my mind.

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Then he gets out of the car, and waves at me ambiguously.

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I wait another second, grumble internally, and make a choice.

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I decide, because I drive a tiny Fiat, to pass him safely but narrowly on his left. And that’s when I see the girl on crutches on his right, who needs significant help. And I see why he might have picked a center lane that prevents people from speeding by. He is stopping traffic to make things safe.

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And I realize, only too late, and since there is now nowhere for me to stop, that I am just the jerk who couldn’t spare a few seconds to support a conscientious driver helping a woman in need.

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Great.

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I leave Manhattan, and head to Queens, where I stop to get gas. This sets me up for moment two

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I go to the front pump.

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A cab driver behind me, a middle-aged Indian man with a kind face gets out of his car and says something sharp and indecipherable. I feel like I’ve been yelled at, which is confusing coming from a smiling man. Annoyed, I look back. He points to the ground. I have dropped something – it happens to be medicine I will definitely want later. ?It is at this point I realize that what he has said to me is good morning. And what he is doing is make sure I don’t lose the thing that just fell out of my pocket. I thank him and go inside.

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Great.

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I never want to be too stressed out to be kind.

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I never want to be too busy to recognize someone else’s kindness.

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Often, I manage to be both.

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This, however, is where too many of us live.

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I do not consider myself a New Yorker. I have lived in this city a mere 24 years. Many would call me a newcomer. That said, I am definitely more a New Yorker than I was in 2000. And I am certainly a fair bit different than I was in Brattleboro, Vermont, Or Amherst, Mass., or Los Angeles. The city has a way of rubbing off on you without asking.

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I have heard it said of New Yorkers that they are unfairly branded as rude. And they are not rude so much as busy. Everybody has somewhere else they need to be. So when you walk slowly, or drive slowly, or get in their face with a request, you are in their way.

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What I find, however, is that if you can startle people out of their tunnel vision, they are often delighted, even determined to help you.

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Sometimes, though, we are not in a position to receive the blessing.

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I have had the experience of being the only white man in the ‘hood, in a car, yelling to a young man on the sidewalk that he has dropped his wallet. It took a second, but it ended well.

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I have also had the experience of attempting to communicate as a white man in a traffic dispute in the ‘hood that I come in peace and apologize for my mistake. It did not end well (a praying hands gesture that comes naturally to me was interpreted as mockery by a black man, and more importantly his fabulously escalating wife. I see your ???? ?and raise you ?? .)

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Now, both of those events were many years ago. These days I just find myself trying to be a good neighbor, and often feeling like I succeed on the second try. The first try, however, is messy.

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Today I’m praying that I my first take is accurate. I pray that my first words are edifying. I pray that my first actions build more bridges than they burn.

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And I pray the same for you.

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Safe driving.