My birthday is relatively early in the year, so I tested for my permit in early fall. Since then, I have been practicing for my driver’s license. I spent a lot of time over spring break driving around nearby neighborhoods to test out different settings.
On a recent Monday, I even visited the roads around the Santa Clara Department of Motor Vehicles building.
As I was parking along one of the roads, a giant truck full of high school girls passed by. I’m not the most skilled at parking (yet), so I took some time. It could not have been more than a few extra seconds. Being cautious is hardly a crime worth screaming about.
The truck must have really needed to go to the bathroom, though, because the driver honked obnoxiously several times and proceeded to speed by at a heedless 100 miles per hour as soon as possible. One passenger rolled down her window and screamed, “Learn to drive!” among various profanities.
There are so many things wrong with this instance of road rage.
First, a student driver, by definition, is learning to drive. So their “clever” insult didn’t even make sense. Everyone has the right to make mistakes while learning, especially ones as trivial as parking slowly. Harassing a student driver does nothing to teach him or her how to drive.
Second, taking a few seconds extra to park a car certainly does not put anyone in danger. The worst the event did was slow down that truck momentarily.
Finally, the truck should not have been going by as fast as it was in a residential area. Disrupting the neighborhood so early in the morning with both the horn and the profanities could not have pleased residents.
Road rage is always ugly. It’s even uglier when it’s directed at a student driver who’s obeying the rules of the road and doing no harm to anyone.
