Saturday, November 14, 1998

Nice people can turn into monsters when they get into their cars

By Lauren R. Stanley

Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service

ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- Last week, in the early part of a glorious afternoon, a man walked out onto a bridge spanning the Potomac River and effectively brought the entire Washington metropolitan area to a screeching halt.

The man was distraught over events in his life, and had decided to kill himself by jumping off the bridge into the Potomac River.

The police -- from three jurisdictions, Washington, Virginia and Maryland -- felt they had to choice but to shut down the entire bridge, which links Virginia and Maryland and over which 150,000 vehicles travel each day.

Within an hour, backups had been created that eventually stretched over 20 miles long. People -- many of whom did not know what was going on -- were trapped in their cars in long lines, the ends of which couldn't even be envisioned, for hours at a time.

While negotiators worked with the distraught man, trying to keep him from killing himself, the hard-driving people of the area began to show their true natures.

Some of the folks trapped in the long backups were quite good-natured about the whole thing: A man was in need of help. Give him help and we'll deal with the delays.

Other folks, however, were less than pleasant about the whole thing. Seeing the chance to move forward by mere inches, they cut off other drivers or wouldn't let them change lanes.

As the backup stretched out and on -- for miles and miles and hours and hours -- people's morbid sense of humor kicked in: There's a man on the bridge trying to kill himself? Push him, for God's sake, and let us get home!

Official decisions to shut down the entire bridge for this one man were -- and still are being -- questioned by people who put traffic patterns over one man's life.

Even I -- after being trapped not once but three times by the bridge closure -- declared that the police should push the guy over and rescue him from the river.

Frustration over my inability to get to where I wanted -- not needed, but WANTED -- to go overrode my concern for this one man's life.

Granted, I didn't know what was going on, because the radio station to which I listen did not tell listeners WHY the bridge was closed, only that "police activity" had shut it down.

I didn't know, until almost six hours after the drama began, that this one man was so upset and so depressed that the only way he could see to escape his dark night of the soul was death.

Afterwards -- when the man indeed did jump from the bridge, only to be rescued by police within seconds of hitting the water -- I reflected upon the callousness that captures so many of us just because we are in our cars.

I've seen this phenomenon over and over again: People who are the nicest, most considerate folks in the world in almost any other situation get behind the wheel of a car and become monsters.

We cut each other off.

We refuse to let each other change lanes.

We succumb to road rage.

And when we do, we give up our claim to community and all attempts to love one another as Christ loved us.

Turning the other cheek, which is hard enough to do in most circumstances, seems to be totally forgotten by many people once they get behind the wheel of a car.

We are our most isolated when in a car.

We become, whether we like it or not, islands unto ourselves, with only our own concerns in front of us.

We become less human.

A few days after the man tried to kill himself, one of the negotiators spoke about what it was like for her that day on the bridge. She spoke of the tension, the not knowing whether the man was armed (which is why officials closed the entire bridge, over concern for others), and of the intense focus it takes to try to talk a man back into life.

At the end of the interview, she said something that reminded me again of our need to be more concerned about others and less concerned about ourselves:

If it were my brother or father or cousin or husband or son, she said, I would want someone to help him. That's the most important thing.

Helping a person in need, she said, was more important that getting to wherever we think we need to go.

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I have, on my key chain and dangling from my rearview mirror, two items that are meant to help me remember that just because I am in a car, I am NOT an island. The two items -- a key chain decoration and a bracelet -- both say "WWJD," which stands for the question, "What Would Jesus Do?"

I have them in those places because I need to be reminded -- especially in the car -- that Jesus would not cut off others, would not take a parking space from another, would not curse out another driver for cutting me off.

I have them because, like all too many people, it is easy for me to forget the simple lesson taught by Jesus: Love your neighbor as yourself.

I don't like getting cut off in traffic, which happens daily in this area. I don't like having someone zip in ahead of me and get the parking space I was eyeing. I don't like having someone tailgate me, or run the red light and almost hit me, or honk at me because I am moving too slowly for them.

So I look at my reminders and think to myself, It's OK. Take a deep breath and forget about it. Let the other guy go first -- it won't kill me to wait or walk a little farther.

And yet ...

When a man's life was at stake, I reacted in a heinous way. Push him, for God's sake, and let us get home!

There are times, like last week, when I wonder anew if this proliferation of cars is such a good idea. I wonder why so many of us so easily become monsters behind the wheel. I wonder why we think that once in the car, we are the most important people in the world, and why we think we can get away with such atrocious behavior.

A few days after the drama on the bridge, I was driving to my bank. As I rounded the curve, the driver of a rather large truck looked right at me, blew through four yield signs and cut me off. If I hadn't known he was going to refuse to back down, I would have been hit almost broadside by a vehicle weighing four times what mine weighs.

Believe me, I backed down. Not without a few choice words, I grant you (no swearing, just the question I always ask the other driver, who can't hear me in any case: What?! You couldn't SEE four yield signs?!) But I DID back down.

Because I knew -- beyond the shadow of a doubt that that particular driver didn't care one whit about me. That he wanted -- not needed, but WANTED -- to get wherever he was going faster than me.

I backed down because I knew that this other driver, who probably is a really nice guy most of the time, had climbed behind the wheel of a truck and become a monster.

I need to pay more attention to my WWJD reminders, especially when I am in the car.

I need to remember that loving my neighbor is a whole lot more important than getting wherever I want to go.

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(The Rev. Lauren R. Stanley is a priest of the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia. Readers may write to her care of Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service, 790 National Press Building, Washington, D.C., 20045.)

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(c) 1998, Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.