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Lanesmanship

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I came late to driving. In fact, I did not get my license until I was forty. Starting late as I did, I did not have many youthful bad habits exercising a baneful effect on my driving.

Other than adhering religiously to speed limits, what probably characterizes my driving more than anything else is, whenever possible, knowing what lane I want to be in and sticking to it, unless I feel I absolutely must pass some slow-moving vehicle.

Returning home from the desert, for example, I prefer to take the Pomona Freeway (California 60). I start out in lane 2 and change to lane 1 as I approach Interstate 5. That lane in turn becomes lane 3, giving me several miles to change to lane 2. If I stay on lane 2 as the highway becomes the Santa Monica Freeway (Interstate 10), I can ride it all the way to my exit ramp at Centinela Avenue fifteen miles farther on.

Why change lanes unless you have to? One of my beefs with performance cars is they feel as if they fail to change lanes every hundred feet, Elon Musk or Ferdinand Porsche will come and painfully twist their privates and take away their car keys. I estimate that, on the same trip, frequent lane changers drive 10-15% more miles as a result of traveling sideways.

Gridlock on the Nile

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I have just enjoyed reading Rosemary Mahoney’s Down the Nile: Alone in a Fisherman’s Skiff about her trip—solo—in a rowboat between Aswan and Qena. I loved her description of what it’s like to drive in Egypt. Following is a selection from her chapter on Luxor.

Egyptians drive in a fashion that could only be described as chaotic. They seemed compelled to position their car in front of the one ahead of them at any cost. At night they drove with their headlights off until an oncoming car approached, at which time they helpfully blinded the opposing driver with a sudden flash of the high beams. And Egyptian highways were minefields of disaster. There were always skinny figures leaping across them at just the wrong moment, entire families sitting down to picnics in the middle of them, cars speeding along them in the wrong direction, men stopping their cars to pee in the fast lane, sudden pointless barriers stretched across the road, or wayward oil barrels, or boulders, or a huge herd of hobbled goats. Every ten miles or so the hideously crushed hull of a truck or car would appear at the edge of the road, the rusting, twisted remains of past accidents, and yet these gruesome and shockingly numerous reminders never seemed to chasten Egyptian drivers. They raced and careered and honked their way along with the heedless abandon of people who believe either that they are invincible or that life has no value whatever.

The Narcoleptic Driver?

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I was very late learning to drive. It was not until age 40 that I got my first driver’s license. Around that time, I was on some relatively ineffective blood pressure medications that had all sorts of nasty side-effects. Apresoline attacked my joints and made me averse to any sort of movement. Ismelin (which I called Dismalin) made me impotent. And Catapres turned me into a narcoleptic: Whenever I rode in an automobile or bus for any distance, I would quickly drop off to sleep.

Naturally, I was not taking all three medications at the same time; but I had at the time some major concerns about my health. When in 1985 my doctor took me off Catapres, I decided it was now or never. I contacted the Sears Roebuck Driving School and started learning to drive. My driving instructor, Jerry Kellman, was excellent. After a couple of months of driving under his tutelage, I took the driving test and got an excellent score.

No sooner did I get my license than I ordered a 1984 two-door Mitsubishi Montero. Like the model illustrated above, the color was “Dakar Sand.” I was eager to show my father my newfound driving ability, but unfortunately he died of heart failure around that time.

Way back when, he tried to teach me how to drive. But he was so hot-tempered that he would whack me in the head every time I made a mistake; so I decided I would learn on my own. Alas, shortly after I had my brain tumor operation; and everything was put on hold. For my first twenty years in Los Angeles, I depended on public transportation and the kindness of friends.

My Mitsubishi Montero lasted for ten years. Then I burned out the engine by driving up San Marcos Pass in Santa Barbara in low gear. And after replacing the engine (ouch!), my dealership made a mistake that wrecked my automatic transmission. On a trip to Sacramento to see Martine, I started leaking transmission fluid all over the I-5 midway between L.A. and Sacramento. The last straw was in Los Angeles, when an elderly woman driver who was afraid of being late to see her doctor T-boned my car close to home and sent it turning end over end in heavy traffic.

It was only a four-cylinder vehicle, but I grew fond of it.

Parking

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Talk About Something We Take for Granted …

In just about every movie I’ve ever seen, the hero never has any trouble finding a parking spot directly in front of his destination. And, moreover, if there is a parking meter, he never has a problem getting the exact change or running his credit card. As for myself, I usually find that most meters have either been vandalized or never worked right in the first place.

And that’s not the worst of it. To use a meter, I have to make an existential decision. Which is more important to me? Quarters for parking, or quarters for the washer and dryer in my apartment building? Rarely do the meters accept any of my credit cards: I guess it’s more difficult to vandalize the coin reader part of the device.

Today was a rare day for me: When I went to see my doctor, I found a good parking place on the residential street just north of Wilshire Boulevard. Usually, I have to hike from four or five streets away; and even then I have reason to fear getting a parking ticket. Then, when I went to lunch at Gilbert’s El Indio I got the coveted parking space right next to the front door. And I was able to order the excellent Enchiladas Suizas Monday lunch special.

Speaking of parking, I typically avoid parking garages. It’s a quick way to not only empty your wallet but get your car all dinged up. So I have adopted a practice which I abbreviate as PFAW—short for “park far and walk.” I need the exercise anyway, so if I have to walk half a mile from my parking place, it’s probably good for me, no? I always smirk at the drivers who absolutely have to park right in front of their destination, even if it means messing with the flow of traffic. There is a Trader Joe Market near where I live which always has a bunch of “parking playas” jockeying for the ten desirable spots right in front. I just turn on Granville and park about a block away.

Parking is one of those activities that people don’t usually talk about. Yet you will find that the time one spends looking for a parking place (not to mention the money) adds up when you look at a whole year’s time.

Here’s hoping that the magical parking spaces will suddenly be available to you. If not, may you be philosophical about parking far and walking.

Ignition

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Help! My Car Key Is Stuck in the Ignition!

It was not a problem I ever encountered before. As I pulled into the parking lot of a Sprouts Market, I set the transmission to Park and attempted to retrieve my car keys. It was no go. They were stuck in the ignition. I checked that I was indeed in Park. I was. But the key was stuck. After about twenty minutes of fiddling, I was able to pull the key out and do my shopping.

But what was next? If the same problem occurred when I got home, I couldn’t leave my keys in the car with the door unlocked. It would have been an invitation to theft, and to inviting a smelly bum to spend the night in my car, turning it into a mobile dumpster..

So I went straight from the market to my Subaru dealer and reported the problem. I waited for a couple of hours, but it would take longer to fix the problem. So I took the bus home and cooked dinner for me and Martine. It was only then that I got the call from the mechanic that all was well. I will pick up the car tomorrow morning after breakfast.

I would have waited at the dealership longer, but I had a choice of seating by an over-curious dog (I do not like to play with strangers’ dogs) or a software executive who had two laptops and was constantly on the cell phone with Harvey at work. Yechhhhh!

Automotive Heraldry

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There Is Something Classy About the Logos of British Sports Cars

As Martine and I attended a British car show at the Automobile Driving Museum in El Segundo, I became acutely conscious of the snazzy sports car logos—far more sophisticated than most American and Japanese equivalents. Here are just a few of the hood ornaments I snapped at the show. They reminded me of the medieval art of heraldry.

You Can See My Reflection on the Hood

I Had Never Even Heard of This Make

I Don’t Quite Understand the Letters Above the Name “Lotus”

I feel almost Chestertonian in my seeing this heraldic connection, but I really think it is not all that far fetched.

Carvaganza

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A Perfect Car for the Road in Los Angeles

This weekend, a number of museums opened up for Covid-weary Angelenos, among whom are Martine and me. First we ate—indoors—at Du-Par’s Restaurant at the Original Farmers’ Market at 3rd and Fairfax. Then we breezed down Fairfax to the Petersen Automotive Museum at the corner of Fairfax and Wilshire.

Unfortunately, the current exhibits were more oriented toward the bearded and tattooed grundgerati. The museum’s former emphasis on the history of the automobile has been replaced by racing cars, including Maseratis, Lamborghinis, and others. In addition, there were a number of fantasy cars such as the monster above, which was designed for some movie which I likely never saw.

A Lamborghini Racing Car for the Cash-Non-Challenged

Still and all, it was nice to go eat out at a restaurant and visit a museum—quite a change from the previous twelve months. The Petersen was packed to overflowing with visitors who had no idea what social distancing was and why it is still essential. On the plus side, the wearing of masks was de rigeur.

Finally, here is a peak of the dashboard of the original Back to the Future car:

Dash and Front Seat of the Original Back to the Future Car

Putting Myself Down

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I Have Always Underestimated Myself…

When I was young, I was always one of the shortest kids in my class—and one of the sickest. The result was that I habitually underestimated myself. Everyone else looked taller, happier, and more accomplished than me. And that even after I was the valedictorian of my class at Chanel High School in Bedford, Ohio. In fact, it was not until I reached the age of forty that I realized what I had been doing to myself. That was the age at which I was finally able to drive. Before that, I was on a medication (Catapres) that made me fall asleep whenever I got into a moving vehicle.

Within weeks after I got off Catapres, I took driving lessons and passed with flying colors. But then something happened to my picture of other people: The moment I saw drivers who committed moving violations at the rate of once every hundred feet or so, I began to revise my impressions of the rest of the human race.

Politics also stepped in to lower my estimation of my fellow Americans. I first became aware of political conservatism during the 1964 election, when Barry Goldwater was trounced by Lyndon Johnson. Conservatism was to become my bête noire during the following decades, where now I regard most Republicans and Trump followers to be mental defectives. Now that so many of these so many of these Trumpists are advocating a return to normalcy during a dreadful epidemic, I now look at people such as the individuals in the above photograph as suicidal fools who would think nothing of infecting their friends, neighbors, and families with a potentially fatal disease.

Do I have any regrets for being so hard on myself all those years? Not a bit. I think that I am happier than most people and less likely to be played like a marionette out of baseless fears.

 

 

Bad Ass Drivers

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Typically, the Bad Ass American Is Most Readily Found on the Road

A few days ago, I wondered why Americans were so intent on playing the role of the bad ass. Of course, the great theater of bad ass behavior is to be found on the streets and roads of your neighborhood. And you don’t have to go very far to find them.

Everybody is familiar with the over-aggressive goon who cuts you off in your lane with inches to spare. You can beep your horn at him, but that will only give him a warm glow that he not only got away with it, but succeeded in annoying you in the process. You can catch up with the louse and give him the finger or verbal abuse, but that could place you at risk. These are not nice people. Being not nice is a way of life with them and affords them some form of satisfaction.

On the other side of the spectrum is the (mostly) woman drivers who in their minds see stop signs at every residential intersection, even when there is none. Although there are hyper-aggressive women drivers as well, intent on proving their status as bad ass malefactors, most women do not fall into this category. Texting and otherwise driving distracted is not so much an instance of bad ass driving as it is an invitation to disaster.

Ultimately, the only way to deal with real bad ass drivers is to see them the way a Buddhist monk views venial sins: with complete equanimity. By reacting at all, you are in danger of allowing yourself to be distracted.

It would be nice if there were more police enforcement of moving violations, but I suspect that the highways of America will become choked with gory bodies before the men in blue could be lured from their coffee and doughnuts.

I Go To See the Dalai Lama

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The 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso

In April 1991, I drove up to Santa Maria to rendezvous with my friend and business associate George Hoole. The next day we were going to go to the University of California at Santa Barbara (UCSB) to see the 14th Dalai Lama give a talk. My attendance at this talk cost me a great deal: Driving up the San Marcos Pass on State Route 154 in second gear, I burned out the engine of my 1985 Mitsubishi Montero. That was just the beginning of my problems with the Mitsubishi, which lasted another four years before being T-boned by an elderly woman who was afraid of being late to a doctor appointment.

Although I knew my visit was going to cost me dearly, I remembered the Dalai Lama’s talk with great fondness. It is the only time I ever saw one of the world’s great religious leaders in person. I have read several of his books since then and realize that he is a living treasure. When he passes on, which can be any time now, the world will be without a man of his spiritual stature. Of course, the Chinese will be delighted: They will simply choose their own Dalai Lama. Will the exiled Tibetans in Dharamshala, India choose their own candidate? Who knows?

Present at UCSB when George Hoole and I were there was the late Spalding Gray, author of Swimming to Cambodia, who did an interview with the Dalai Lama which was published by Tricycle. In that interview, the following appeared:

Do you ever entertain the distractions, invite them into your meditation and let all of these women in bikini bathing suits that you must see here out by the pool come into your meditation? As a monk, I have to avoid that experience, even in my dreams, due to daily practice. Sometimes in my dreams there are women. And in some cases fighting or quarreling with someone. When such dreams happen, immediately I remember, “I am monk.” So that is one reason I usually call myself a simple Buddhist monk. That’s why I never feel “I am the Dalai Lama.” I only feel “I am a monk.” I should not indulge, even in dreams, in women with a seductive appearance. Immediately I realize I’m a monk. Then sometimes in my dreams I see fighting with a gun or a knife, and again I immediately realize “I am a monk, I should not do this.” This kind of mindfulness is one of the important practices that I do the whole day long. Then your particular point, about beautiful things or men, women, things that attract: the analytical meditation counters that attachment.

For example, the sexual desire. It is very important to analyze, “what is the real benefit?” The appearance of a beautiful face or a beautiful body—as many scriptures describe—no matter how beautiful, they essentially decompose into a skeleton. When we penetrate to its human flesh and bones, there is no beauty, is there? A couple in a sexual experience is happy for that moment. Then very soon trouble begins.

I can see that if I ever wanted to achieve enlightenment, I have a long way to go.