If you have kids in school, you know that the dropping off of children is anything but fun. We have a diagram of traffic flow sent home at the beginning of the year. It's stressful. In fact, just last week, we got this email from our principal:
"I wanted to inform you of an unusual situation that took place earlier today just outside of our school. Two of our parents experienced some difficulties which required the assistance of the law enforcement. Working with the officers we were able to resolve the matter.
As a precautionary measure, we put our school in a heightened state of alert. No one at any time was in danger. This message is being sent to effectively communicate with you and keep rumors from being started. "
Ofcourse the email itself ensued a chaotic mass of chatter and rumors among parents anyways. My guess was it was some freakshow of divorced parents right out of Days of Our Lives, or road rage from a minivan not moving fast enough for a dad who had to take the kids to school in his big ass rig and was trying to shlep them off and get to work.
Word on the streets was - it was the latter of the two options.
Today, it's rainy. So, no one is walking their kids to school, making more cars for more rage to pour into the school parking lot in a 10 minute time period. Every day, we try to leave early to beat the mass of crazy traffic. And everyday, we leave just in time to get in the middle of it.
I come from a suburb in Houston folks. Traffic and road rage are a hobby in my family lineage. I got some great one liner insults and learned all the bad words just by riding with my parents (mostly my Dad) in the car, and I can remember twice when he reached for a gun under his seat. Which made him even more angry because the gun wasn't there one time. It's Texas folks - seriously.
But here in the Big O - it's the good life, and I opt to just not be angry at it. To embrace it. Crank on the tunes, rock it out. We'll get there happy instead of rupturing an ulcer. It IS a little frustrating, when you're at the same light for 20 minutes, but we did it.
About 10 minutes into it, Lucy chimes in: "Mom, why don't you gooooooo, the light is GREEEENNNNN."
"Well honey, I can't because there's several cars in front of me. It's just traffic."
Slight pause, she's looking around, assessing all the traffic. Looking. Looking.
"It's THAT lady's fault mommy. Tell her to go! Look, she won't go!"
"Sweety, I'm not going to yell at traffic. She can't hear me. It's kind of like when you're watching SpongeBob - you're windows are closed. Can't hear me."
And then Max, "Well honk your horn. She'll hear you!"
We inch up a couple of car lengths.
"The horn is just for emergencies. No one can move, it's just traffic."
Lucy says, "Yeah, it's raining so there's more cars."
"That's right sweetie!" I was impressed that she figured that out. She's in the first grade and already so smart. Don't you think?
Lucy needs to blame someone, "We should have left EARLIER."
Still maintaining my calmness and after a sip of delicious java, "Yes, you're right sweety, we should have." But really it was MAX'S fault because he had to get his hat and he can't ever find ANYTHING and it took 3 whole minutes. But whatever.
Killing time, "I'm glad we live in Omaha and not a big city. You two would go crazy with traffic in a big city like Houston. Sometimes it takes 1-2 hours just to get to work!"
Lucy: "WELL! I'm glad I don't WORK then!"
Me too, honey. Me too.
That's how I roll.
I'm a fan of a little system I coined called the "triple crown" of road rage. To achieve the "triple crown" one must do the following 3 actions all in unison.
1. Honk Horn
2. Throw the middle finger out of the window in frusturation
3. Yell a choice vulgarity
Sounds easy, but doing all 3 at once is a challenge. 2 of the 3...no problem. 3 of the 3 though....well that's a different matter.
That is so precious.
You really need to live somewhere wtih school busses....the best ivention EVER.