Week 4: Giving up something comfortable

Also read other posts with the label 52 small changes

For five years in the US, I not only drove, but also immensely enjoyed it. I never saw it as a chore, something to be afraid of. I gladly gave free airport rides early in the morning. I would drive from Lincoln to Omaha to get some mutton biryani in a jiffy. I needed no nudging for long road trips, and most of them, I did singly. I drove anywhere between 300-500 miles (one-way) during long weekends, visiting places like the Niagara Falls, New York City, and Princeton during my stint on the east coast (that later became my PhD). Before I left for Germany, I had embarked on a 22-day long road trip that lasted roughly 8,000 miles, driving from Nebraska to Houston (to renew my passport), continuing to Chicago (to get a work visa) before visiting Washington, DC to say goodbye to close friends and finally getting back to Seattle where I sold my car. If I did not run out of time with my driver license, I would have continued my road trip (driver licenses expire with visa expiry).

Things changed when I left for Germany, forcing me to rewire my brain. I could no longer afford to keep a car for various reasons (including not wanting to understand road signs in German). As if on cue, I also discovered the joys of efficient and reliable public transportation in Germany. I took trains all over Europe, all the way to Denmark and Sweden in the north and Slovakia in the south. Where trains did not go, buses and airplanes did. I walked too. It was the best healing experience after being forced to sell my car and give up my driving license when I left the US.

After two years, I moved back to the US. I live in a mid-size city now with a population of about 0.2 million people. Unless you live in a big city like New York City or Chicago, most of the US has bad public transportation. I was prepared to go back to my old ways of being. I thought that I would buy a car, get a driving license, and in no time, I would be driving once again to the mountains, to the nearby cities and quaint little towns.

But in these two years, I had changed. I no longer wanted to go back to my old ways of living, especially after I had completely weaned myself off it. Although I got myself a driving license, I did not want to buy a car unless I absolutely needed it. My wish must have been heartfelt, for things evolved in a way that worked out for me.

On day one at work, I was given a bus pass that would let me ride any bus within the city for free. Next, I realized that the home I had chosen was very close to a bus stop. Then, I realized that the only bus in front of my apartment took me directly from home to work. I saw that as a sign from the universe. I decided to hold off on buying a car for as long as I could. It’s been 18 months now, and I haven’t regretted one day of it.

Why I prefer life without a car?

·       It saves me a lot of money (in buying and maintaining a car). Fuel. Insurance. Parking. Repair. Routine maintenance. Tabs and taxes. Leisure trips. It all adds up.

·       No parking expenses and speeding tickets.

·       No more whimsical trips. I used to do them a lot before, mostly to meet people who are not active in my life anymore anyway.

·       I walk more and make healthier life choices. Sometimes, I walk partially to work till I get tired and then hop on a bus.

·       Riding the bus is a social experience. I get to meet and talk to a lot of people. I have some bus buddies too, and some of the drivers know me now.

·       I manage my time better (since the buses run once every 30 minutes during the day, and once every hour in the evenings). I don’t waste time at work doing random things like spending time on social media. When I am at work, I work.

·        I don’t have to show up to places I don’t want to. It’s much easier to say no to people when you do not have a car.

·       I buy only what I need and what I can carry with me, resulting in less clutter at home. My fridge has never looked better. My grocery has never looked healthier. Often, unhealthy food choices are also heavier to carry, like sweetened beverages. The grocery store is right next to my bus stop. Not only do I get free transportation to work, I get quick access to food too.  

·       I get to take the Amtrak train more often and love the experience.

·       I drink less coffee and do not make sugar-craving induced, impulsive trips to expensive coffee shops anymore.

·       I consciously live in a lovely neighborhood where I can walk to nearby parks. It is a very pretty neighborhood, great for both my physical and mental health.

·       I look at the weather website more often. I ask for directions. I look at maps to figure things out. I carry my umbrella with me now. I take slightly different routes sometimes to get to know the city better. I plan my time and my life better now.

·       I don’t go on impulsive trips to the shopping mall anymore. I use that time to pursue hobbies like reading and writing.

·       I sometimes read on the bus.

·       I use all the time and money I save to spend more time with my family in Kolkata, and also continue my world travels to different countries. My local and domestic (within the US) travels have drastically reduced now.

Challenges of not owning a car

·       It gets pretty cold and icy in winter. They do not always clean the sidewalks properly. Walking on icy sidewalks is dangerous.

·       Sometimes, I have to work until late and buses run infrequently. If I do not want to wait for another 45 minutes to take the bus, I have to take a cab.

·       I don’t get to pursue photography as much, since I am mostly restricted to taking pictures of places I could only walk or take a bus to. No more impulsive sunrise photography trips.

Clearly, my benefits outweigh my costs. Plus, I have a license, I can always rent a car (I have only done it once during the past 18 months). More importantly, I get to experience the thrill of doing something differently and making conscious life choices. For those who think that your lifestyle dictates whether or not you need a car, maybe your need for a car also dictates your lifestyle choices. I know it because I have lived both the lives now. When I had a car, I did a lot of random things, justifying that I can do it since I have a car. The day I absolutely need one, I will go ahead and buy it. Until then, I look forward to all the new life experiences borne out of not having a car.

sunshine

Your adviser is the driving instructor

In a previous post, “working for myself,” I drew an analogy between driving and doing research as faculty. The next obvious question would be “How do I know as a faculty where I should drive to?” It is not easy to know that, it takes years to figure that out (I am still figuring out, maybe some do it sooner). A PhD training plays an invaluable role in this.

Role of your adviser

Consider your doctoral program a well-known driving school and your PhD adviser a renowned driving instructor. Their main and perhaps only duty is to teach you how to drive (do research). Sure, you can learn driving from your parents, neighbors, or the distant cousin who is visiting from Canada. But learning from a good driving school prepares you for real driving on the bumpy roads of life (getting your hands dirty with real data) and not just in the parking lot or in simulated roads on video games (made-up data we sometimes use to practice statistics in class). Sometimes, your adviser is a big-shot training instructor. In that case, other lab members such as senior PhD students and postdocs take you out for a ride to teach you those driving skills. So it is important that you have a good relationship with everyone in the lab. Your adviser doesn’t just teach you how to drive. They let you go to conferences where you showcase your driving skills in front of an audience. They write grants and get you funding so that you always have fuel in your car. They write you good recommendation letters so that other places can hire you as drivers. They advise you when your car isn’t running well or your engine is making a funny sound and you need to troubleshoot. They give you a pep talk on days when it is snowing outside and you don’t feel motivated enough to drive. They teach you life-saving skills such as changing lanes, looking at your blind spot, racing, parking on mountains, parking downhill, and avoiding drunk drivers on the freeway.

Couple of other things that happen in your PhD training

1. You take coursework. Consider courses as the tools that help you to be able to do research. If you are training as a driver, it will help to know a little bit about the mechanics, the nuts and bolts, where the engine is, how the brakes operate, how the radiator works, how to change a flat tire, and why driving in a certain way may be better than driving another way. Coursework just doesn’t teach you the skills to drive, but also the knowhow to stop, park, check engine oil or maintain the car.

2. You build collaborations with your peers and other professors. In the world of research, carpooling is way more fun than driving singly. Sometimes, you get more gas/petrol (funding) if you are able to show that if you are carpooling (collaborating), rather than taking a lonely trip from Seattle to Boston and not being fuel-efficient. Gas stations most certainly frown upon single drivers. But how do you ensure that you get along with the other carpoolers and don’t end up going for each other’s throats on the freeway? Graduate school lets you find other drivers you might get along with. Big gas stations (funding agencies) like the NIH and NSF will not even give you any fuel if you are young and applying singly or as the main driver. That’s when established professors will be on the driving seat and you in the passenger seat.

3. You identify mentors in other professors. Remember, you have the closest relationship with your own driving instructor. But sometimes, they are too busy or gone. Sometimes, you don’t get along with them. Sometimes, they do not know a skill that you need to know because driving regulations have changed in your generation. That is when the other mentors ensure that you continue to do well and your car(eer) doesn’t stall in the middle of the freeway.

Your research agenda

Your primary research agenda is usually an offshoot of your adviser’s research agenda (it could be different, but I am speaking from my experience). You spend maximum time with your dissertation data that is based on your adviser’s project and research interest. Let’s say for my PhD, my adviser trained me to figure out the shortest, safest, and the most fuel-efficient way to drive from Seattle to Mount Rainier National Park. I demonstrated to my dissertation committee that my car runs fine, I can check blind spots, I don’t get killed while driving on I-5, don’t run out of fuel, and can apply the proper gears and brakes depending on road or weather conditions. Now the fruit doesn’t usually fall too far from the tree. So after this, perhaps my own independent research could look into how to find an optimal route that connects all three national parks in Washington State in the most efficient way. I create that knowledge for other people to use. Or maybe now, I base my research on a real-life problem, for example, why do most people who take a particular smaller state freeway from Mount Rainier to Mount St. Helens after sunset get killed. If I never took that Seattle to Mount Rainier training for my PhD, I would have never figured out how to move ahead in life from Mount Rainier. I would not even have reached Mount Rainier.

And the convocation ceremony? Consider it as a public event where your adviser officially gives you your driving license. He comes wearing his driver’s uniform and you wear yours. The world rejoices, your parents fly to attend the ceremony beaming with pride and wiping tears of happiness, and some big-shot celebrity driver comes to give the convocation speech.    

I am waiting for the day I will be sitting in the main driving seat as the principal investigator (PI), my adviser and other colleagues in the passenger seat as co-PIs, and together, we will drive around the world with tons of fuel supplied by the NIH or NSF looking at interesting research problems.

sunshine

Driving again

There was a time until 2014 that I could not imagine my daily life without driving. I loved driving. When someone needed a ride to the airport or needed to be picked up, I was the one who would volunteer. When the PhD adviser needed someone to drive 3 hours one way to visit some research sites, I was the one who would volunteer. It almost seems like a different life now.

I drove for the first time after 27 months, and it was quite a humbling experience. I suddenly became every nervous driver I never understood- those who complained of loud music, fear of speed, fear of changing lanes, etc. I know people who have either never driven on the freeway by choice, or have been practicing in the parking lot for years. It did not help that unknowingly, I picked the worst day weather-wise to drive to a nearby city for work. I had hoped for some parking lot/empty street practice first, but the car rental company had a busy parking lot that directly opened to one of the busy arterial streets that further took me directly on the freeway during peak office hours. Snowflakes (that later turned into slushy rain) started to fall fast and thick as I put the key in the ignition. I have never been this nervous even during that first driving test.

With a thudding heart and shaky hands, I started, took a few wrong turns, got on the freeway, in the wrong direction. I made a bunch of blunders. I struggled for the basics- staying in lane and not taking a wrong turn on one-way streets. 27 months is a long time, it is three full-term human pregnancies, back to back. Imagine not writing or not cooking for that long and then one day, suddenly starting to do those defensively (Also, cooking wrong doesn't kill you, but driving wrong does). Little things rattled me, like that tiny rear windshield wiper that suddenly started to wag its tail like a lizard's. Among the myriad of switches, I had no idea how to turn it off.

In this nervousness to drive, I actually forgot to panic about my upcoming and dreadful dental procedure, prioritizing my panic issues. The last few nights saw me spending hours in bed sleepless, googling for articles with search words like, "does one forget driving after two years?" Hear me out, from my personal experience. You don't. But you get rusty. Real rusty. Your instincts are not as sharp anymore, and the fact that you are nervous and overtly alert makes it worse. Pro dancers do not think and then do a series of steps mechanically, they just do it with fluidity. Public speakers do not rehearse every word in their head before speaking up, it comes naturally. When you analyze every future step in your head, you instantly become a bad driver. Driving to me was always calming. I never analyzed it, and I never feared it. Today was different though.

I think I finally understood what driving memory means. Sure, it is knowing how much to swerve left or right without going out of the lane, or how quickly to change lanes without hitting or being hit. It's all those little measurements in your head. But how much of that constitutes actual driving? During long distance freeway driving, it is actually remembering to coordinate your foot between the brakes and the gas pedal. We do it sub-consciously. Most drivers control the speed of a car on a freeway by taking their foot on and off the gas pedal, they do not hit the brakes unless there is a pressing need. For me, that instinct has rusted. People usually drive defensively, which also means sticking to speed limits. I drove like a mouse, I no longer felt I own the road like I used to. I constantly drove 5-10 below the speed limit (driving 25 at 30 and 50 at 60). This is because the sensors in my brain have somewhat lost the perception of speed. Earlier, I did not have to look at the speedometer to know if I was speeding, I just knew it. Now, I did not have a clear sense of how fast or slow I was going without constantly looking at technology. An analogy would be knowing how much to turn on the gas/cooker to fry your onions without burning them. You do not constantly check the temperature of the flame to see what temperature produces what heating effect. You just do it instinctively and with visual and olfactory cues. You know that probably 5 minutes is too less but 30 minutes is too much. The speed sensors in my brain went nuts, they thought that I was speeding while in reality, I was not. Multitasking was another issue- keeping your eyes on the road in front of you, on traffic behind you, staying in your lane while constantly checking on your speed and also listening to a very harsh-pitched, talkative GPS that I had never used before while driving a car that I had never driven before. It sounds complicated when I put it like that, but really, it is not. Every time a huge truck went past me, my car shook, and so did my hands. These things do not bother seasoned drivers. But one day if you suddenly forgot and had to relearn how to walk, walk with speed, and not get killed while walking, imagine your horror.

So when people say that driving memory never fades, what they perhaps mean is that people still remember to maneuver their cars, turn left when they intend to turn left, and right when they have to turn right. That knowledge never goes away. What gets rusty is the fine tuning- how much to hit the gas pedal, when to start applying the brakes, and how quickly to change lanes. But perhaps, the memory comes back with practice, just like with most other things.

Driving those 160 miles was the most stressful thing I have done recently, and I came home and crashed for two straight hours, I was so exhausted from focusing on the road all the time. I am actually looking forward to taking the bus tomorrow morning. I wanted to meet a friend, but changed my mind after my morning drive since I wanted to be back before it got dark. These things never bothered me before, I have breezed through some of the notorious cities like Chicago, Miami, and Houston. Yet today, I struggled to wade through the paddy fields at a humble speed of 60. Summer of 2014, those 8,000 miles driven all over the US in one month was my reality. And today is also my reality.

sunshine

A car(e)free life

Priorities change. Our fears change. We change.

My greatest stress about moving back to the US involved getting a new driver license. When you have been gone from the country for 2 years, you are out of the system. Everything needs to be done afresh, and involves liberal amounts of paperwork and running around.

Multiple Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) offices in the area told me that I would have to start afresh- clear the knowledge test as well as the driving test. Although I drove quite a bit for 5 years, more than the average person does, knowledge test involved studying, and often memorizing facts that were not directly relevant (e.g., remembering permissible blood alcohol levels for someone who doesn't drink). I was lazy and did not have the mindset to study.

And then, the actual driving test- a chicken and egg problem. You cannot rent a car without a driver license, and if you don't rent a car, you cannot take the driving test. I do not know anyone outside work here, and when I was invited to attend a Sunday bhajan followed by a vegetarian potluck, I was convinced that I am perhaps better off not knowing anyone outside work. Now how would I get a car?

Burdened by these (first) worldly problems, I decided to at least get a state ID first (needs to be done within the first 30 days). I show up with all my documents. The first person at the counter confirms that this will be a state ID and not a driver license. I need to take the driving test in some other location that needs prior appointment. So I wait patiently until my name is called and I walk up to the counter to get a state ID.

"Your driver license expired in 2014. I see that you did not renew it."

A gut feeling inside told me to keep mum and nod, without explaining that I was gone from the country.

"If you pay a fine of such amount, we can renew your license," I could not believe my ears.

Quickly, I paid the fine, furtively looking around and making sure that no one comes from behind and gets me in trouble. With a racing heart, I quickly took the vision test, pledged to donate my organs when I died, smiled for a horrible ID picture, paid all the dues, gave copious amounts of thank yous and sorrys for not renewing on time, and ran out of the DMV office once they issued me a temporary driver license. I did not even stop to use the restroom, lest they change their mind and take away my new license.

Twenty six months into not driving, I got a driver license. Just like that. Without a knowledge test or driving test. Two weeks later, the actual driving license was in my mailbox.

That was part one of the story. Part two is, around the same time, I had an epiphany (with old age, I have many these days) that I did not want to own a car anymore. Not for the time being at least. Yes, this is coming from a person who drove 8,000 miles solo in one month before leaving the US, and suffered from strong separation anxiety when she had to sell her car. I used to itch to drive other people's cars after that. But as of now, I am done with my love for driving. The only three places I know in town that matter (home, work, and the dentist's office) are all connected by bus. Seattle is only a flight away. For other things, there are cabs. This aligns perfectly with my aim to live like a minimalist. A car means additional costs for gas, parking, insurance, and maintenance. Taking the bus makes me walk more, meet more people (I have already made friends), and plan my days better. Restricted mobility also means not being tempted to do unnecessary things, like driving 2 hours to a neighboring city for good biryani. I used to do that all the time. But now, I am happier getting home and reading a book than driving to someplace with no clear aim. And if I am suddenly dying to drive all the way to Southern California or Florida, I can always rent a car.

It's funny how things changed with time. My car was my life, and I could not imagine life without driving. Then, Germany happened, the much needed reset button in my life. By doing the same set of activities, I was engaging the same neural networks in my brain. Now, I was forced to develop newer networks, new skills- learn to take the train, learn a new language, learn to make conversation with the bus driver, and so on. Eventually, I reorganized my life around different hobbies that did not involve driving. Even with a driver license in my hand, I do not care to drive anymore. It's a truly freeing experience.

sunshine

Skidding into the new year

Most people in this world started the new year making resolutions they will not keep, or traveling to exotic locales and showing off. Some did both.

For me, it was a day of miracles. I was traveling for the holidays, and was on my way back. The flight was delayed by a couple of hours, and by the time I landed at night, I saw that everything below was white. I checked the temperature to be minus 15 Celsius. This was going to be interesting.

While driving back home from the airport (60 miles away), my car skid on the ice, and spun out of control, not once, but twice. The first time was when I had just stepped out of the airport parking. I tried swerving to the left, but it swerved fully, and came to stop facing oncoming traffic. I was really surprised, as this was the first time it had happened. Quickly, I reversed the car on the shoulder and started driving. I could barely see the lanes, not just because it was dark, but because snow covered half the lanes. It was hard to tell if I was overstepping the lanes. I decided to drive slower.

The second time turned out to be almost fatal. I entered the freeway, and realizing that the speed was 60 mph and I wanted to go slower, I shifted to the rightmost lane. They had mostly cleared the snow, but not completely on the rightmost lane. During the day, snow melts, but at night, due to extreme temperatures, the cold water melts back to ice (ice offers less friction than snow). The moment I entered the rightmost lane, I felt my car spinning out of control. I made the mistake of braking, more instinctively than anything else. The car spun 360 degree a couple of times, barely missing a pole before stopping to face the oncoming traffic. It was like reliving an action movie in reality. A head on collision was inevitable.

Yet, both me, and my car had a miraculous escape, unscathed. Traffic was less, and the few cars coming in my direction quickly shifted lanes and zoomed past me. Thankfully, I was quick to gather my senses, move from the highway, and take the next exit. I was shattered. I had considerably slowed down and taken the exit, but the inner roads were worse. They had not really cleared the snow from the inner roads, and every time I tried taking a turn, my car skid. Finally, I found a parking lot, parked my car, and inspected the damage. The mudguard was caked with a thick layer of black colored snow (probably a mixture of snow and dirt). It was freezing and I could feel hypothermia setting in. I locked inside my car and howled for quite some time. I did not have the strength to drive back.

It is no use to think what could have happened when nothing happened. The skidding must have been for less than a minute, but it was the longest minute of my life. Sadly, after all this, I had to muster the courage to drive for 50 miles to get home. Emotionally, I was shattered. 

Today, I skipped work to skip driving, but tomorrow, and everyday after that, I have to drive. I do not drive rashly, do not drink and drive, do not text and drive, and do not even take phone calls while driving. I have driven for 4.5 years and more than 50k miles now, going all over the country, in busy cities and mountains. I was not even speeding yesterday. In fact, I was slower than the speed limit.

Driving is an enjoyable activity for me because I know how to confidently control and maneuver a heavy body moving at a great speed. Yet yesterday, I experienced firsthand what skidding and getting out of control feels like. Snow that has frozen into ice is dangerous, and trying to brake, even instinctively, caused my nemesis. This is the first time I have been in an accident. The rest of the 50 miles, I drove at 55 in a 75 mph zone, with my emergency lights on. It was a nightmare for me.

It's not an experience anyone should have to face, but now that I have done it, I am thankful to be alive and to be writing coherently, using correct English. Coming this close to a fatal accident and escaping unscathed makes you believe in miracles. Surely it was an interesting, although unexpected start to the new year. But like my friend says, now that you are done with it, there will not be any accidents for the next fifteen years.

sunshine

Day 2: Feeling Driven

January 2^nd, 2013

            As I landed to the familiar sights and smells of the US, the only question nagging me was, would I be able to drive after a 5 week long hiatus? In these 5 weeks, I had seen my share of rash driving in India, wondering how people drove without lanes, never bothered to check their blind spots, and rarely wore seat belts. I took a cab to where my car was parked, and as usual, got into a conversation with the cab driver. He summarized his life history in about 3 minutes, and asked me every possible question that I have ever been asked by a cab driver. Am I a student? Will I be a (medical) doctor? Did I get a full scholarship? Why was I single and living far away from home? The guy from Afghanistan had 7 more siblings back home, and never went back ever since he moved here years ago (I never ask why). And then he told me how he would drive the same route everyday, for 5 months, because his son was getting a heart surgery. He woke up at 4 am, drove 5-6 hours round trip, visiting his son at the hospital every day. He told me he decided against a heart transplant for Jamal. I told him it must be hard being a parent, watching your children suffer. I told him that I would never understand what he must have gone through. He told me that you learn to respect your parents more the day you have your children. And then I saw his eyes glitter as he dug the picture of Jamal on his iphone. I had expected him to be older, but Jamal had celebrated his first birthday 2 days ago. He looked like a bonny baby, a cute little bundle of smiles, the last person you would think needs a heart transplant. It’s amazing how everyone is coping in their life, including a 1 year old.

“Is Jamal your only son?”, I asked.

            The cab driver smiled sheepishly, and told me how you are not considered a man until you have a big family. Jamal was the third one. The fourth one is on his way in 2 weeks.

            He dropped me off to my car and left. I walked up to my car nervously, loaded my suitcases, and prayed that the engine had not died due to the cold weather. It took me about 20-30 minutes to feel normal on the roads again, while I drove slowly and nervously, got honked at a couple of times, and realized that I had forgotten I had to step on the gas and speed up. I was consistently driving 10-15 mph below the speed limit.

            Once I got comfortable behind the wheels, I started to admire the landscape and the freedom I had left behind. Despite many plusses that India is, low cab fares, being able to afford a driver, and so on, I always lived with a feeling of dependence in India, depending on someone else to drive me around. Sometimes the cab drivers refused to go where you wanted do, fleeced you, and argued. Even when hiring a car and being driven around, the fun of being behind the wheels was gone.

            I turned left on a highway at a certain point when I saw the car from the opposite flick his high beam lights at me. In the next 2 seconds, a flurry of thoughts crossed my mind. Did I forget to turn my headlights on? (It was broad daylight). Was the guy checking his own headlights? Was I speeding? Within 2 seconds, I spotted a cop car hidden in the bushes. I grinned from ear to ear, now realizing what the driver was trying to warn me about. Talk about skillful communication. Perhaps I should return the favor to someone someday.

            I reached home after 2.5 hours of traffic free driving. After putting away the food in the fridge, I switched off my phone and slept for 10 hours straight. I don’t really remember the last time I had slept this long.

            For the last two days, I haven’t been able to get the song “Matru ki bijlee ka mandola” out of my head. Seems like it is time to burn a new CD for my long drives.

sunshine

Turning Three

I wonder if it is weird to remember the birthdays of your car, your house, your blog, or of other dear but inanimate possessions. I remember the date I moved to the US, I remember the date I moved to Virginia. And I remember the day I bought my car. A private dealer in Kirkland sold me the car after a two month hunt, right after my Mount Rainier trip on a sunny summery day in 2009. I had not even passed my driving test then, and my friends drove it for me. During the initial few months, everyone except me drove my car. We took her to the Bothell temple that evening and did puja. The very next day, she had a flat tire. My mother often wonders when she will be able to sit in my car and have me drive her around. I know the feeling. No one in the family has owned a car before. Driving in Calcutta is suicidal. I usually take the metro, bus, or a cab there.

She has been a good car, and has driven with me to so many places. I hope I can take her to Canada some day. I hope that we can do a cross country drive someday. Well, Boston is not really cross-country, but at least we are going to Boston this weekend.

Here’s wishing my sunshine car a happy three years, and here is wishing us many more years of travel together. I hope we get to see a lot more of the country together.

sunshine

Social interactions inside a car

The inane and eccentric philosophies of life make so much sense while driving. For hours, I would stare ahead in front of me, the solid yellow lines on my left giving way to the dotted yellow lines, and then solid yellow lines, orange lights changing to reds and greens. It is amazing when I thought of the complex web of social interactions that happened in the confines of a car.

I am a seasoned driver pretty used to driving alone. I will often hop in my car at the wee hours of dawn and keep driving. Although people frown upon driving alone, often claiming that company in the car not only kills boredom, but also makes it safer to drive, I disagree. I often roll down the windows while driving, strong gusts of wind caressing my face and disheveling my hair. I put on my collection of favorite songs, alternating between car CDs and car radio. I listen to rock, jazz, ghazals, Bollywood numbers, Bappi Lahiri, Quick Gun Murugun, Shyama Sangeet (devotional songs for Ma Kali), and sometimes songs in languages I do not understand at all. I often shake my head when I listen to songs in Tamil and Marathi. I sometimes lift and fold my resting left leg, strum my fingers on the wheel, whistle, or sing with the music.

Things change somewhat when I have company. The inside temperature is constantly micromanaged, someone repeatedly turning on or off the air conditioning, fiddling with the vents and so on. Then, there is some rewinding, fast forwarding, or mild alluding to the mismatch in music taste. Radio channels are changed, CDs are shuffled, and there are constant complaints about the music being too fast or too loud. This is when there is just another person.

Three is even more interesting, especially if I as not driving. The dynamics of who would sit in the front passenger seat changes with the kind of relationship shared with the other inmates of the car. For example, the right to sitting in the front usually belongs to boyfriends, girlfriends, spouses, co-owners of the car, people with long legs, prettier faces, people higher up in the academic or professional food chain, non-drivers who need to navigate, or simply tantrum throwing people. There is hardly any control over the conversation (especially if it is in a different language), music, or the temperature of the car. However, staring out of the window from the backseat and pretending that others did not exist usually works.

Ditto to problems with four people in a car. If there are couples, they would usually retire to the backseat, ensconced in love, sharing hushed glances, holding hands, whispering jokes, talking about their own worldly problems, about what brand of mustard oil to buy from the trip back to the grocery store, to reminding to return the phone call of Kamalamoni mashima who is visiting her daughter in New Jersey from Naihati. You drive in pensiveness, with no idea about who is Kamalamoni mashima, or why did she choose to bring a tin full of roshogolla from Nobin Chandra Das instead of chumchums or pantua. Things get pretty interesting when the fourth person in the car is a baby. Babies have the right to pee, poop, puke, spit food, or throw tantrums in the car. Of course the right to eating in car is not restricted to babies alone. Not to mention the fight over the directions, whether the GPS is right or the iPhone is right, allusions to gender-based stereotypes of poor driving, that you constantly witness as a spectator from behind.

The worst case is when there are five people in the car, and a combination of everything happens. Someone is constantly changing music (from condition two), you are sitting in the back (from condition three), there is a couple sitting beside you (from condition four), and they are either embraced in sleep, constantly snoring, and occasionally leaning and falling on you, or are in heat. For me, the worse has been sitting in the back seat, while the newly wed Mrs. Wifey was learning how to drive, controlling the steering with a shaky hand, Mr. Hubby was teaching her to drive with endearments like “Shona” and “Mishtu”, and Mrs. Sister-in-law sitting beside me in the back was constantly talking about accidents, hit and runs, and insurance coverage. Of course no one thought of asking me if I am comfortable with the situation. Why would they? I am neither a Shona, a Mishtu, a spouse, a boss, nor a baby enchanting others with her smile.

Hence I prove my point. There is nothing like driving on your own, alone.

sunshine

(P.S.: For the first time in my three year driving history, I accidentally jumped a rather innocuous looking red stop sign today)

Cross-Country

For the longest time, I have wanted to do a cross-country road trip in the US, all by myself. Learning to drive back in 2009 was an ordeal for me, but a few thousand miles and a few speeding tickets later, there was no looking back. I think I have read up all the literature blogs that exist about cross-country trips. I know some people who are crazy about bike trips in South America (A Ghost of Che: A Motorcycle Ride Through Space, Time, Life and Love by Mauktik Kulkarni being one such book based on that). Consider a cross-country trip being one such dream.

            I have often interacted with cross-country drivers, getting some very humorous takes about their journeys. A friend once called his mom on the phone and said, “I am about to embark on something and you have to promise that you will not say a no, and you will bless me”. I would be thinking that my boy has decided to elope with someone from a different race and religion and marry, and I am sure the mom thought the same too. She was delighted when she was told that it was “just a cross country road trip” and she willingly gave him her blessings.

            I have a friend who did a smiley road trip, starting all the way from Boston, dipping down to Texas, and then going up until Seattle, creating a pattern of a smiley on the US map. Then I have another friend who has driven cross-country thrice. I recently came across a travel blog where the guy decided to do a road trip, touching all four corners of the country, from Florida to Maine, to Washington, and all the way to Southern California. I could only raise my eyebrows in amazement.

            I have briefly brushed over the chances of a potential road trip, but things have never worked out. When I moved to Virginia in 2010, I decided to drive all the way from Seattle. A month before the proposed trip, I tripped and injured my left leg on the streets of Sicily in Italy. It was a miracle making it back to the US, being in a wheel chair most of the time. The road trip never happened, and I had to ship my car.

            

Come summer, I get a little jealous of all these people who move across coasts and drive there. The most I have done so far is driving as far as Rochester, a 500-mile one way trip. Surely I have driven about 30,000 miles in the last three years of driving, but a cross-country has never happened. I hope that next year this time, I have graduated, have a job waiting for me in the west coast, and I can drive all the way. Fingers crossed. In the meantime, I have been driving all over the east coast this summer, and am especially looking forward to the trip to Maine in a few weeks. After having touched the southernmost tip of the country in Florida, the northwestern most tip near Neah Bay (Olympic National Park), and the westernmost tip of Europe (near Sintra in Portugal, see picture), this might be another “cutting the corner” trip. Next week this time, I will be celebrating three years with my car, my single most expensive and dearest materialistic possession I have had so far (the next one being my camera).

            Long live summer !

sunshine

Not eve(red)dy

Driving after a while becomes second nature. You do it subconsciously, just like walking to the department every morning, multitasking while talking on the phone, or giving directions to your home. When you are new to driving, you are always alert, looking for the faint signs, every change in traffic light even from a distance, of pedestrians crossing, or changing speed limits, or slowing down signs, even birds flying or cars passing you. With time, you learn to relax while driving, your seat starts to recline more, you begin to brake and accelerate without remembering it, and you sometimes drive to the nearby grocery store, not even remembering what you saw on the road. You brake to a red light instinctively, slow down sub-consciously, without even aware of doing it. Perhaps that is when one needs to be worried.

Although driving has transformed from an uncomfortable to a comfortable and now to a relaxing task for me, I have never taken it lightly. I still indicate while changing lanes, slow down while taking a U-turn, or look for cars in the blind sight while changing lanes. It so happened that my friend pinged me one night when I was about to go to bed. It was almost midnight, and he asked if he could get a ride back home. He had missed the last bus. Although sleepy, I left to pick him up and drop him home. I knew the roads, hence did not take my GPS. I took the right turns, picked him up, chatted with him while driving, and dropped him home. And on my way back, I did the most horrible thing I have done in my driving history. I jumped a red light.

I knew it instantly I did it. I was tired, sleepy, and I still wonder how I did it. I have never jumped a red light, and never hope to do it again. The consequences could be disastrous if it was not for a cold wintry December night when the streets were deserted. I had never experienced this, but the moment I realized I had jumped the red light, my first instinct was to brake and drive back to the signal in reverse motion. Horrible and fatal mistake. Never try to go back if you have accidentally jumped a red light.

I came home feeling sick and dizzy. Every time I replayed the situation in my head, I felt nauseous. I could have been hit sideways by an oncoming vehicle. I could have had other people in my car. I could have been dead. Not only had I endangered myself, I had also endangered oncoming traffic. I have never considered myself as a traffic hazard, and although it was a lucky escape, I felt horrible.

Driving is as much a privilege as a responsibility. Whenever I hear horror stories about cars hitting and slamming into each other, or pass by cars in an accident with the blinking blue light of the police and the ambulance, I always thank myself that I was not one of them. I could have been one of them, with or without my fault. Jumping a red light was scary, and I hope it never happens again.

sunshine

My Traffic Theory

A few months ago, I generated a social theory stuck in traffic for almost 2 hours. I had to visit the city to get some work done. Aware of the office traffic in a big city after living in one for years, I started at 5 in the morning to be able to reach there on time. The drive was just 2 hours, but I did not want to be held in traffic at any cost.

As luck would have it, I was caught in the worst form of traffic 18 miles prior to hitting city. I looked at the time. It was still 6:45 in the morning, and the drive had been smooth so far. However, little did I know I was going to spend the next two hours cruising through those 18 miles in bumper to bumper traffic.

As the minutes ticked by, traffic started to get heavy. My plans of being there on time, or even finding street parking were jinxed. Sitting in traffic having nothing to do, I observed an interesting phenomenon depicting a particular risk-taking trait of human behavior. The freeway had 4 lanes on each side. The leftmost lane was a High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) lane, also known as the carpool lane. This means that at certain times of the day during peak hours (from 5 am to 10 am, and then from 3 pm to 7 pm), only vehicles with two or more people could use that lane. This is mostly to encourage people to carpool. Knowing the number of people who drive singly in the US, you would be amazed how empty the HOV lane usually is.

In the process of waiting in bumper to bumper traffic, I observed from my left mirror that more than half the people using that lane were single people in the car. It confused me somewhat, angered me all the more, not only because people were not supposed to break traffic rules, but also because here I was going to be stuck in traffic for the next few hours. None of these people driving singly had any expression of guilt on their faces. When observed closely, it is possible to notice the behavior or facial expression of other drivers. People drove in the “forbidden” lane with a stoic, business-like expression, without caring that they were breaking the law.

As I inched a little forward, I noticed that the cop got hold of one of the girls, and was giving her a traffic violation ticket. Since it was not possible to speed in heavy traffic, and since she was alone, I figured she was getting a ticket for driving in the wrong lane. However, during the entire 18 miles, I just saw 2 cop cars giving tickets.

Now let’s forget morality, traffic rules, and civic sense for a while, and see what’s happening here. I was frustrated as I was caught in heavy traffic for just one day. These people are regular office commuters who need to face this every day. They need to get to work on time. The traffic was horrible even as early as 6:45 in the morning, God knows what it would be at say 9 am. Now the entire 18 mile stretch of road (even more for some) was going to be like this. Who could afford to wait for 2 hours in traffic snarl every day? 

The daily commuters must have figured out that not more than 2-3 cop cars span the entire stretch. With hundreds of people breaking the law, and just 2-3 cop cars in 18 miles, what was the probability of getting caught? If 2-3 people get caught and fined every 18 miles, what is the probability that you will end up being one of them? We are talking probability here, and not morality, okay? For every person getting a traffic ticket, there were hundreds of cars that sped by. So let’s say you get caught once every month for driving in the wrong lane, and then get fined for say $100. That is the price you pay for getting to office on time every day. Since this is not a speeding ticket, I am hoping the insurance premium would not go up every time you got a ticket.

Of course it is all wrong, the idea of having rules is to stick to them as best as you can. But how does one cope when faced with dire situations like this every day? Should they start even earlier, maybe as early as 5 am to reach somewhere at 9 am? Every day? Or just take the risk, pay like a hundred dollars every month (which is about $5 everyday to reach on time, not a lot for people who earn), and move on in life? Certainly the roads were not equipped to handle peak hour traffic without people resorting to unfair means. Clearly there are more cars than what the roads can hold during peak hours. Thus, isn’t this a workable strategy to lessen your stress by not getting caught in traffic for hours? Surely when enough number of people do something that is wrong or forbidden, it does not remain that wrong or forbidden any more.

[To be clear here, I am not advocating for the phenomenon that was going on. I just observed a human behavior in a small sample of people, and tried generating my theory to interpret the risk-taking behaviors of these individuals]

sunshine

Edging towards Ageing

I was driving towards New York. It was this long drive that took me around 5 hours, and I was not even half way through. I wanted to see if I could drive that long without taking a single break. I zoomed passed all the freeways, my car consistently running 20 plus mph for every specified speed limit. This was what freedom and liberation must feel like, I thought to myself, Neeraj Shridhar screaming loud decibels from the songs of Love Aajkal in my car stereo. I got off a particular freeway to get into another, and the GPS showed a stretch of narrow, single lane, non-freeway road in between. It was a quiet day with barely any traffic. Good news, since that meant I might reach my destination sooner. I sped and zoomed for a while on the road, being the lonely driver that I was, till I saw a vehicle at a distance. It was in the same lane that I was in, and it could be an optical illusion that before I knew, I was right behind the car.

It seemed the car was moving really slow, although there was no traffic in front of it. It was an old car, and I tried to look through its rear glass to see who was driving. I looked at my odometer and here I was a good 15 mph slower than the speed limit (I usually drive 10-15 above the speed limit). It was frustrating, I tried signaling to the driver, I tried indicating, I tried to signal with my headlights, but nothing worked. I tried not to honk as it is rude, but I was so tempted to. I looked in my mirror and there was a steady queue of cars trailing right behind me. Who was this person driving the car ahead of me? If he had to drive slow, why didn’t he pull over and let us pass? Being the sexist that I am in certain things, I was so sure it was a dumb woman driving. It was a single lane narrow road and there was no way I could speed past the car as it was a hilly road with less frontal visibility. The car continued its snail’s pace for about 10 miles of that narrow, countryside road before it slowed down and pulled over to let me pass. I was fuming by this time, not knowing what kind of a person would drive so slow and not let me pass.

As I sped past the culprit car, I craned my neck to have a look at the miscreant driver who wasted so much of my time and slowed me down. There I saw an old man, all wrinkled and shriveled, clearly in his 70s. Something in my heart just tightened at this sight. I felt guilty that I had been frustrated at this old gentleman who could barely maintain the speed limit. Clearly at that age, it was a difficult task to drive, let alone drive in speed. It pained my heart to see him alone, something very characteristic of this country. Why would an old man in his 70s have to drive alone? Because it is a lonely place to be in at age 70, and still have to do your work on your own without help. He sure must be honked at and signaled whenever he drives. But, what can he do about it?

Scary enough, I imagined myself at that age, 40 years down the line, trying to drive my car with a line of cars honking behind me. Old age sure is a scary thing to transition into, when your faculties and your friends fail you, when you are left to be on your own and no one cares about your existence anymore. It’s scary to think that someday I would be frail, dependent, a nag, a constant complainer, a person lacking in judgment, ignored, unattractive, slow, a traffic hazard, senile, cantankerous, absent-minded, angry, forgetful, lonely, burdensome, out of touch, hard of hearing, have poor eyesight and judgment, useless, crabby, whiny, a hot ginger tea-drinking drinking arthritic, heavily bespectacled, liver spotted, fat, fumbling, frustrated, ineffective, slow, short tempered, out of shape, wrinkled, rambling, set in my ways, mean, childish, crotchety, complaining, alone, stubborn, incapable, decaying, humorless, pitiful, meddling, advice giving old woman. I could mention more adjectives if this doesn’t explain how I am going to turn out to be 40 years down the line.

Old age is a socially constructed omen. The society likes to paint rosy pictures of cute children holding their mommy’s hands, of industrious men wearing suits and making business deals, of teachers enlightening students and of lovers holding hands by the lake. But the society is not always inclusive of the older people. As I write this, I wonder who constructed the term “old age”, and how exactly do we know at what point we transition into old age. Is a 35 year old single man too old to get married? Is a 40 year old woman too old to try having a baby? Do we ever turn too old to fall in love? Why is it that we are always “too old” to do something? Too old to learn new tricks? More importantly, how exactly should I prepare myself for old age? Should I treat it like an investment policy and make lots of friends so that I am not left alone when I am senile? But then I am assuming that these friends will stand by me when I am old and frail. Maybe I can get married, but there is no guarantee that my husband will stick around long enough to cope with my failing memory and missing dentition. I will be like a baby once I am old, dependent and needy, only this time I will not have my mother around me to take care of me and help me grow.

Dear old man, I apologize for being impatient while you drove slowly. I cannot imagine how difficult it must be to drive and take care of yourself at that age. I can only write this post on this blog, because some day I will be in your shoes, driving slowly, and someone less than half my age will get restless and worked up. This is how the world works. In chains and cycles.

sunshine