So, I've been commuting for about 6 weeks now. For the most part, its fine, though my absolute faith in "Driving Karma" has been shaken.
I used to believe fervently in "Driving Karma" -- that every good deed done on the highway or in downtown traffic would be deposited into my Karma bank and then when I needed to make a withdrawal (like avoid an accident or manage to pick the right lane during rush hour) then my Karma would be there. It is a nice metaphor to encourage relatively polite driving behaviour.
The problem is, there are some not-so-nice people out there who take advantage of us Karma-ists. The tailgateing, the weaving, the jockeying, the lack-of-signal-usage .. and they just *assume* that other drivers are the Karma-ist faithful who will blithely let them in.
When I first learned to drive, the father of the friend whose car I was using to take the test (thank you Carmen Medina) told me "You won't have an accident as long as you don't drive while angry. Don't drive angry." Which is excellent advice. And advice that still rings in my ears today. So when these a-Karma-ists bully about the roads I tell myself "calm blue oceans, calm blue oceans" and try not to get upset.
And for the most part, I am fairly successful.
However, what I have noticed is that my general politeness has reduced. I haven't been letting in people who are trying to merge into rush hour traffic; I haven't stopped to let someone turn left in front of me onto that little side street where they live. And it comes from a feeling of being tired of being taken advantage of. The day to day commute uses up my general good will towards other drivers -- its been spent just not getting angry at the a-Karma-ists.
I wonder if someone has written "Chicken Soup for the Commuter's Soul".
Something that did make me smile on the drive in this morning .. one of the big electronic ad boards over the QEW had a very large "Server Proxy Error" on its screen this morning.