The Passing Game

So, passing. No, I'm not talking about football, even if it is Super Bowl Sunday. I'm talking about when you're driving. Especially on the freeway. Passing other cars. You know? Seems to me - for some reason - a lot of folks really are uptight about passing. Or more correctly, about being passed. It seems to really bug people when you pass them. It's almost like a personal affront to them that you would even try to pass them, like their manhood (or womanhood, as the case may be) is completely tied up in not being passed by anyone else. Since I have to drive on the interstate in order to get to and from work every day, this has become something of an annoyance to me. Not being passed - I could care less if you feel the need to pass me. No, what annoys me are the people who can't bear to be passed. I find that these folks fall roughly into three categories.

The first group of people who have trouble with passing are the ones who come up behind you, drive along in your wake for ten or fifteen minutes as other cars are zooming past, and then suddenly shoot by you like you have been purposely slowing them down. It's weird, cuz no one was keeping them from passing you before. They had ample opportunity to make their move and get on by you. It's almost as though, having fallen in behind you, they think to themselves, "Sixty-five isn't a bad speed. I can do sixty-five just like that guy in front of me. Think of how much gas he's saving. I'll save some gas too and go sixty-five from now on." But then, all those seventy and seventy-five mile-an-hour cars keep whizzing on by. And after a while, it's like that person behind you just can't bear the fact the he or she is being passed by all of these people, people who are obviously more manly/womanly than them, people who don't care how much gas they're burning, as any red-blooded American shouldn't. And it gets to be too much for them, and they stomp on the gas pedal and shoot around you, leaving you to choke on their fumes. Boy, they showed you.

Remember Driver's Ed?

The next group that annoys me is the leap-froggers. You all know these folks. They're the ones who pass you, pull into the lane in front of you, and then SLOW DOWN! Now if you're like me, and you use cruise control (You know? Cruise control. Those little buttons on the right-hand side of your steering wheel. You set it at a certain speed, and your car goes that speed, and you don't have to touch the gas pedal? Try it some time). Anyway, if you do use cruise control, leap-froggers are extremely annoying, cuz in order to keep using your cruise control, you now have to pass them. So you do. Then they speed up again, pass you, get back in the lane in front of you, and then SLOW DOWN AGAIN!! What's that all about? So Cruise Control Ben is forced to pass them yet again. And what do they do? You guessed it. Speed up, pass you again, pull back in front of you, and then SLOW DOWN AGAIN!!!! I kid you not, I was stuck with one of these yahoos for thirty miles yesterday. The only way I was finally able to get rid of her was to speed up to seventy-five and leave her far behind me.

The third group, and the one that torques my jaws the most, is the one who just will not let you pass, period. You're travelling faster then them, you come up behind them, pull out around them, and as you are passing them, they speed up. And if you speed up to get on by them, they speed up even more. It's as though their very lives depended on not being passed. And these are the majority of drivers out there. I read that over seventy percent of men and over sixty percent of women speed up when they're being passed. So what's the deal people? Is your identity completely wrapped up in your ability to keep other people from passing you? Guys, is your manhood in such a fragile state that my passing you is going to shatter your egos and leave you little more than quivering masses of jelly behind your steering wheels? And ladies, are you in such need of exerting your superiority that you can't bear the thought that some lesser person might actually pass you?

To all of those who have serious fits when it comes to being passed, all I can say is LET IT GO! Your identity does not depend on whether or not someone else passes you on the freeway. And if it does, man! You need some serious long-term therapy. Just sayin'.