Scattered

I think I’m a bit scatter-brained. I get excited about something and very into it for a short while, but then I lose interest. I can’t seem to keep all of the elements in my life that are important to me running at the same level. If I focus on one area then another suffers. That’s my excuse for starting this blog (is it that, or something else?) and then not posting anything for almost a month. Aside from the fact that I lose interest and veer off course and onto something else, I also have three different blogs that are used for different things! I’m not very prolific on any of them.

I started a riot at work yesterday. My team was sitting around our meeting table to celebrate a birthday. Someone was talking about downtown Portland (where I live) and the construction that is going on right now. Some were skeptical about how it will work, but they seemed uninformed. I directed them to the TriMet website to check out an animation that shows how it is supposed to work. Being good, single-driver-in-a-car Americans, several people were still against the idea and seemed to think that this change and focus away from cars is a violation of their civil liberties and basic rights as an American. (Should we not be called North Americans, or more specifically citizens of The United States of America (that god-blessed country of meat and potatoes, George W. Bush <bows head slightly> and ripoffs of British sitcoms and reality shows)? Or how about this mouthful: United Statsians? Maybe I should have made the Title of this post I Digress. )

So I said that I think the downtown area should be off-limits to motor vehicles. . . . Silence . . . “I want to kill you right now” stares . . . Hmmm. Seems that people don’t like that idea so much. The thing is, people are crazy about their cars. But I don’t think they understood what I meant, and I probably did a less than adequate job of explaining myself. I came up with the idea while walking home one night. Being a pedestrian during rush hour is dangerous. Everyone is in a hurry to get home, and they’re isolated behind the wheel from other humans. It’s easy to be in your own world with your music playing; a cell phone to your ear; fatigue from the work day and thoughts of dinner and the rest of the evening in your head. So, should you be excused from scaring pedestrians and whizzing by them inside your two tons of metal by a simple, semi-apologetic wave of the hand? Does that suffice to say, “I’m sorry for nearly running you over and making you feel threatened, but you shouldn’t be scared by my aggressive nature or the fact that I know you would hardly dent my car if I accidentally hit you, and the fact that I see you now and offer to let you cross in front of me and acknowledge your existence with a slight hand wave proves that I am human and not as evil as you think I am right now now please hurry up and get outtamyway I have to get home and put a casserole intheoven and this phone call is really making me upset and who do you think you are anyway? Have a nice day.” Hmmm . . .

I don’t think my teammates understood. If only they had to spend some time being a pedestrian around town or riding a bike on the open road, then they might understand how threatening cars can be, and how little effort is needed to wait a little longer to rush around the corner when the pedestrian is crossing in front of you, or how easy it is to slow down a little behind a cyclist until their is a good opportunity to go around affording them a wide berth in the process. I don’t think they understand.