I noticed it almost immediately. I had picked up my rental car at the Hertz outlet near JFK Airport. I've been doing this trip and routine for about 20 years. I pulled out and got onto the highway for my usual traffic-clogged ride up to Westchester.
Nobody was going anywhere too fast, but, almost immediately, I noticed a surliness from other drivers. To me.
A guy behind me flashed his lights at me. Hmmm, had I left the cargo gate of the SUV open when loading my luggage? Did I have a flat tire? Was I dragging a pedestrian?
He passed me and gave me a dirty look. Several more times, I was cut off by other drivers. It was as if I was driving too slow like the little old man from Pasadena. I looked at my speedometer. I was doing a suitable 60 mph.
I will tell you that this kind of behavior happened over and over and over on my trip. What the hell was I doing wrong? I learned to drive on NY streets. And my driving skills were modified and adapted on the freeways of LA where craziness is a common and accepted art.
Several days into my trip, I was driving with a friend as passenger to a Met game at Citi Field. As I was cut off by another driver, I asked my buddy what was going on. As a New Yorker, had he noticed this behavior on the road?
He had. It was not my imagination. New York drivers had become super aggressive in the last year or so.
Hmmmm, what is behind this? A genuine malaise from people who were cooped up in quarantine for too long? A reaction to rising gas prices? Political disenfranchisement? Fans still perplexed as to why the Jets are never any good?
It could be a combination of a lot of things. But I was not crazy. The road tension is real and palpable. And this is coming from somebody who drives regularly in Los Angeles.
Honk, honk. Get out of my way!!!
Dinner last night: The pre-game buffet at the Dodger Stadium Club.
1 comment:
I was back in NY in mid-June and noticed the same thing going into and out of Manhattan (not so much in the Westchester suburbs). Also, I had forgotten what horrible shape the roads are in, especially compared to our (now) home in Florida/
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