THE "RIGHT-OF-WAY" MENTALITY

Tell me I'm not the only one who is highly aggravated by today's mentality, particularly on the part of teenagers, but definitely not restricted to them, of "I have the right-of-way." What is right-of-way, anyway? It refers to the "right" of one entity taking precedence over the "right" of another. In other words, when two cars come to an intersection, the car without the stop sign, or the car with the green light as opposed to the red, has the "right-of-way." Or, in the case of a pedestrian in a crosswalk, he has the right-of-way over any vehicles that are approaching. Okay. I'm sure you all knew that, but I just had to say it. Now let's explore this right-of-way.

I'm sure that many of you have already guessed, and if you hang around me very long you will know for sure, that one of my huge pet peeves is the attitude of people who use crosswalks today--and many who DON'T use the crosswalk, just cross illegally in the middle of any street they feel like crossing. Maybe it was just me, maybe I was a dyed in the wool coward, but back when I was a kid, when I crossed a street, crosswalk or no crosswalk, I RAN. Or at least I walked fast. Nowadays I think about the poor car having to stop and then build up a head of steam again after the pedestrian has crossed the street. But that's life, right? Especially if it's nasty weather outside. I don't begrudge any pedestrian crossing the street while that driver sits in his nice warm car and waits for him.

HOWEVER... I do begrudge the pace at which 90% of the population crosses that street. I mean, hey, let's face it: A lot of drivers don't stop at crosswalks? Why? Well, some are probably not paying attention, and maybe they didn't even see the person who wanted to cross. Shame on you, buddy. Pay more attention. And I'm sure some are just plain rude from the get-go. They feel like their time is more important than anyone else's, and why should they have to stop when they're going down the road peacefully at 25 mph? I can see that point, but if every driver had the same attitude, some days, and in some crowded cities, people would NEVER get across the street. And then there's a third group: the group who have been burned so many times by stopping by today's pedestrians that they are fed up and don't feel like they owe much of anything to someone trying to cross the road.

Okay, here's a scenario: You're driving down the road, and you near a high school. It's still 25 mph, right, because by the time a kid reaches high school he's supposed to be smart enough to look both ways before he crosses the street. Great. You see a kid or two walking toward the curb now, so like a good guy you come to a stop before the intersection. In the old days, said kid or two would then hurry across the street, and maybe even wave at you for being polite enough to stop for them. You would both smile at each other and go on your merry way, pedestrian feeling good that driver had stopped, driver feeling good that he had been polite and that the pedestrian had kindly thanked him for it. Today? Today most of those kids would hit that intersection, and IF they even looked to see if a car was approaching they would SLOW DOWN their pace, not speed it up. They would adjust their all-important headset, or turn nonchalantly to talk to their friend. And some might as well get on their hands and knees and crawl, for all the speed they muster. And of course, while performing this act of utter sluggishness in the face of the driver's show of responsibility, most of them would never DREAM of giving the driver a smile or a wave. Why? BECAUSE THEY HAVE THE RIGHT-OF-WAY!!!! Of course. The right-of-way. It's the law. The driver HAS to stop.

Well, the driver doesn't HAVE to stop. By law he does, but by the laws of nature the laws of man are made to be broken. So what happens when that 1 mile an hour high school kid who wants to exercise his snail's pace right-of-way meets up with the 35 mile an hour pickup whose driver didn't see said teenager? Hmm.... Well, it's nice to legally have the right-of-way, but when that teenager is lying in the morgue, right-of-way doesn't mean a whole lot anymore.

My concern is, whatever happened to common courtesy? Why do so many people, no longer just junior high and high school-age people, but folks of all ages, feel like it's their duty to go across a crosswalk at a third the pace they were traveling when they first reached the crosswalk? Whatever happened to using your "right-of-way" to politely get across the street and let the traffic move on? There's not a sane person in the world who would argue against some little old senior citizen or a person with a handicap moving slowly across the crosswalk in front of them. That's great. I'm glad to wait for them and help them on their way, even though the common courtesy of a wave of thanks would still be appreciated. But where did this mentality of going as slow as one could move come from? Is it all part of the sense of entitlement kids are taught now? The whole idea of "life is all about me, the law says I can do this, and I'm going to make the most of it?" Wouldn't it be sweet if instead of simply following laws everyone still did things for other people out of the goodness of their hearts?

And I haven't even said much about those pedestrians who are breaking the law themselves by crossing mid-street, and who still think they have the right-of-way simply by the fact that they are a PEDESTRIAN and become highly agitated when your rearview mirror almost clips them as your vehicle passes. I know, I shouldn't get that close. But nothing makes me much angrier than sheer rudeness.

Once in a while, I see a kid walk fast when he hits that intersection. Some of them even run, and not because they're in a hurry, because when they reach the far curb they slow back down. That is how my own kids cross the street. Politeness has been drilled into them from a very young age. But many parents forgot that lesson when they were raising their kids. I sure wish we could get that back. I have often thought how fun it would be to take a wad of five dollar bills and cruise around and around the local high school at lunch time, and when any kid hurried across the crosswalk in front of me, get out and slap him a five and thank him for being polite. Unfortunately, I wouldn't need a "wad" of fives. I probably wouldn't use more than one or two. It's sure a different world than the one I grew up in.

So, have you got the idea yet that creeping across a crosswalk is a pet peeve of mine? Oh, right. Maybe I already mentioned that.