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Summertime road rules
By Jennifer Howell
Whalesong Reporter
With summer starting
to show through, we tend to get a little careless. I’ll admit
to it, will you? The sun comes out, we drive a little faster, don’t
pay as much attention, and most of us live by, “it won’t
happen to me.” We get so upset at a person when they pull out
in front of us, then we go down the street and do it again. A lot
of people are hypocritical drivers, and that’s where were going
to get into trouble.
If your thinking that your superman, or that $30,000
piece of metal you sold your soul for is going to protect you, think
again. It could happen to you, the more worried you are, and the
less cocky you are of your driving the better chance you’ll
have of causing an accident. Sometimes there’s nothing you
can do; we just end up in the wrong place at the wrong time. But
if those people had taken five more minutes to make sure their vehicle
was secure to drive, or not been in a hurry, summer would be a lot
more fun. We drive better in the summer because we know that it’s
not slippery and dangerous, but how do we know in the summer that
a bear and cub won’t wander in front of our cars. How do we
know that there’s not loose gravel or built up water on the
road?
Go out and have a good time, give up your keys if your
drinking, would you rather spend $20 on a taxi or know for the rest
of your life that you caused a person’s death? It seems like
little to ask, to actually be careful like everyone always warns
us, but in the long run, the less of a lead foot you are, the better
chance there is of getting where you’re going. If you’re
late be late, it takes a lot less time to drive the speed limit
and get somewhere than it does to clean up an accident.
Admit to yourself when you’re being a bad driver,
the sooner you notice it, the sooner you get back into driving better.
You’re not a good driver until you can get into the drivers
seat of any car and drive it like you’ve been driving it for
the last 10 years. Most of us haven’t even been driving for
10 years. Open your eyes, take that 20-ton vehicle your controlling
serious.
Email Jennifer Howell at jsjdh2@uas.alaska.edu
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