Couple of caveats before I get going, here. First, this happened about six months ago. I’ve been meaning to rant about it since the day it happened, but I’m only just now getting around to it. People always say that I’ll never make anything of myself if I don’t stop procrastinating, but I tell them, “Just you wait!”
Second, although this rant does involve an asshole in an SUV, it is NOT an anti-SUV rant. Most of my friends drive SUVs, and they are all excellent and conscientious drivers. I would really, really, really appreciate it if you’d all keep any anti-SUV comments you want to make out of my thread. I reserve the right to verbally abuse anyone who does not grant me this simple courtesy in the most vile way possible.
Third, I’m typing this on the computer I’ve set up in my garage, and someone just opened the mail slot, looked me straight in the eye, and went away. That has absolutely nothing to do with this rant, but it’s creepy as fuck. Excuse me whilst I fetch a baseball bat.
Now then. After twelve years of putting it off, I finally decided to get my driver’s liscence. (See above comment re: procrastinating.) I spent about a month puttering about suburban neighborhoods with various friends and family members. Finally, my dad had to make a business trip down to Santa Clara, and thought it would be an excellent opportunity to practice freeway and city driving. So, off we went, on about an hour-long drive down the coast through San Francisco and to points further South.
We get to Santa Clara, my dad conducts his buisness, and we head back North. After a couple missed tries (there was some street constuction) we find the on-ramp. I’m on the curve of the ramp, looking to my left to keep an eye on the freeway traffic. I guess I was drifting to the right a little, but it was a pretty wide lane. Then two things happen, more or less simultaneously. My dad shouts a warning and I hear a car horn on my right. I look over, and there’s the biggest goddam SUV I’ve ever seen about a foot away from my (tiny) car, trying to pass me on the onramp. It was jet black, and shiny the way only a brand-new car can be. And, maybe this was just the adrenaline, but I swear to God, it made the Canyonero look like a Matchbox car.
I swerve hard to the left, where, thankfully, there’s nothing but open space. The other driver swerves right, where he clips an concrete embankment with his rear fender. He slows, I speed up, he drops behind me so he’s right on my bumper and leans on his horn. I look in shock at my dad.
“Was that my fault?”
“No. Fuck no! What was that asshole thinking?”
Thinking, it turns out, is not a word that can be applied to this guy. The ramp straightens out, running parrallel to the freeway, but not yet quite a part of it. There’s still that big, triangular, paved no-mans-land between the on-ramp and the freeway proper. This does not deter our intrepid motorist, who immediatly passes me on my left and cuts me off.
At this point, we are no longer on the on-ramp. We are now on the freeway, and should be doing 55, but I’m eye-level with this guy’s bumper, and he’s stopping! By the time I figure out what he’d doing, I’m going too slow to merge with the traffic in the next lane, so I have to stop, too. Which is when the guy gets out of his SUV, on a busy freeway, and starts heading towards me. And he’s a big fuckin’ dude, too. Six foot and change, and he clearly works out a lot. I stare at him in shock. This is pretty far beyond my realm of experience, and I hate to say it, but I don’t have the best reaction time in the world. I look at my dad, to see if he has any suggestions, and his seat is empty. My dad, to whom, apparently, the word “thinking” only occasionally applies, has gotten out of the car to meet this guy head-on. My sixty-five year old, chronically ill father. Is facing down a guy who’s got half a foot, fifty pounds of muscle, and thirty years on him. They’re standing in front of my hood, nose-to-nose, screaming themselves red-faced. I am agog.
Now, this is the part that’s embarassing to admit. I just sit there. I don’t have a clue what to do. I’m not really scared of the guy, although I certainly should be, I’m just in shock. I truly do believe that if he’d taken a swing at my dad, I’d have been out of my car like a shot to get my ass stomped right next to my old man, but thankfully, Captain Testosterone (That’d be the guy in the SUV, not my dad. I appreciate that it might be hard to tell the difference at this point in the story.) backs down. My dad gets back in the car, cursing under his breath, and slams the door. “I shoulda punched that asshole in the throat,” he mutters. Cpt. Testy heads back to his SUV, but before he gets in, he turns around and stares murder at me. I do the only thing I can think of. I flash my biggest shit-eating grin and give him a jaunty wave.
He gets in his car and takes off. He’s not quite done, though. He lets me get ahead of him, then passes me and cuts me off again. This time, at least, he doesn’t stop, takes the next exit, and vanishes out of my life, and hopefully, at some later date, head-on into a lamp post.
I did get a good look at that rear right fender when he cut me off that second time, though. He really fucked up his shiny new car. I take a great deal of pleasure in that. I’m sure that we both left the encounter a warm feeling, but whereas mine was the satisfied glow of seeing an asshole fuck up his new toy through his own stupidity, his was doubtlessly the acidic burn of a new ulcer eating through the lining of his stomach.
