Tuesday, May 26, 2009

They Slowed Behind Me As I Turned

Some mothers’ children do things I just don’t understand. They boggle my mind and I am not that easily boggled [a word whose origin is unknown, in case you wondered]. I am not able to ask these Children of God because we are both driving and it’s really not possible, short of following them home.

I often drive along a road which drops down into an S-curve, near the end of which is a separate tight right turn. That’s where I am going. The curve continues on its way and has plenty of room for at least two more cars than mine, as I am way over on the berm, turn signal on, brake light on, speed decreasing.

The car behind me often stays behind me, speed decreasing, pretty much on my tail but with no intention of taking that sharp right. Obviously, it’s going to continue on the main drag and, just as obviously, I’m bailing out. As the airline pilots prepare to land, I also am at “flaps 40” in full landing configuration.

35, 30, 25, 23. Finally, it dawns on the moron behind me that I mean it: Extreme right lane, turn signal, brake lights, slowing from 50 to 23. “By golly, I better pass him.” Let me point out there is far more room for said moron to pass than said idiot needs. Two cars could pass easily.

At last, courage overcomes stark fear and the vehicle passes – as I am crawling to make the sharp turn to my street. 10 mph.

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

The roots of the word boggled are rooted in Renaissance Scotland. During seasonal celebrations involving celestial observations, the Scots would sing and dance in the fields. They noticed they would move much slower when they danced in a bog. Being reasonably intellegent people, they commented among themselves until someone coined this word, which became part of their unofficial lexicon. You know, I wonder how much of this is true. After all, it's just the musings of an overtired imagination. That's polite for "I made the whole thing up."

June 01, 2009 1:22 PM  

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