The Little Things

What dangers do you face while driving or while on the road? Most people may think about how fast you’re going, or about how many cars are around you. Or you might think about intoxicated or distracted driving, which has become more prevalent in recent years. My concerns are the small things, such as jay walking, getting too focused on the music in your car, “spacing out” and driving past your destination by a few minutes. These are the things that scare me while driving.

First, as a pedestrian, most people in busy cities and small towns treat the road as a game of chicken. Children in small towns get board easily and start walking around town. A car comes by, and they get the idea to try to run across as the street as close to the car as possible. Does this Idea make any sense or have any reason? No, because it’s a child trying to have fun in a quiet and generally safe area. In a city, kids start to get late for the bus or want to hurry to the store or their friend’s house. They see a car coming and don’t think to wait for it, they think “after that car, there’s going to be a line of cars. Let’s run,” and risk their entire life on a few minutes.

Additionally, being a driver after a stressful day van make driving too easy. I can’t count the number of times my parents have driven past their destination because they were dozing off while driving. This isn’t to say they began to fall asleep, but instead to say that they stopped paying attention to where they were going but kept driving in their lane without crashing. I am scared that someday, this may happen in a city, and the events in the prior paragraph may also happen in conjunction, and some random person or child will get hit. I am confident that my parents aren’t the only people that this happens to, as my aunt and uncle (which we share no familial blood ties with) experience the same problem on a regular basis.

Now, my intention in the initial paragraph wasn’t to disregard larger issues in driving, but rather to draw attention to the smaller minutia of issues. There is an alcoholics anonymous. There are speed patrol officers. But there isn’t a way to break a general habit. There are no courses to help you get off of your phone, or to stop chewing your nails, or to stay focused while driving. With the small things covered, Lets talk about the big stuff.

The big stuff is what I refer to as the explicit, or well known. Everyone everywhere has heard an advertisement about buckling your seatbelt, not becoming intoxicated while driving, and even about being on your phone. I would like to discuss what is specifically wrong with each of these things.

Starting off, people have generally lost regard for seatbelts. They aren’t mandated on public or school buses, and in small towns they are ignored almost entirely because everywhere they’re going is usually only a short distance away. It’s seen as a small rule that’s fine to break until it isn’t. Unfortunately, the “isn’t” would be getting in a collision with a large object, such as a (aforementioned) distracted driver.

Additionally, there is intoxication. A fun way to pass the time no doubt, however it is also abused easily, and some people think that only a little bit won’t hurt, but that isn’t true. Thousands of people die car crashes because of intoxication, or public intoxication as people stumble into the road and get hit. The second of which should be avoidable if not for my third point.

Phones. A modern-day pastime, communication, and entertainment all in one. This causes immense temptation based on the number of times I’ve taken the public bus and seen the driver texting home, or the times my parents have swerved into the next lane because they were changing their music on Spotify or YouTube.

These are what should be worried about the most while driving, as they are the things that have the biggest impact on a person’s odds of getting into a crash. That also includes being more mindful of the smaller things that keep you safe in more natural ways. As a pedestrian, you don’t know what any person on the road is thinking or if they will notice you, but as a driver, you should also do your best to be vigilant about the possibility of hitting something or someone.