As I'm sure my close friends and family can attest to, I get very angry when I drive. I'll be very vocal with my critiques of other drivers in the presence of close friends and family, sometimes to the point of pissing off those trusted people in my car. It's not even opinion; it's objective facts—I'll whine about cyclists not keeping to the side of the lane, motorcyclists straddling lanes, assholes not signalling, pedestrians blatantly crossing where and when they shouldn't, etc.. It's so bad that I can start mouthing off within minutes of leaving the carpark, because Singaporeans are all that bird brained. And that's almost "play anger", where I mask my anger with satire. I haven't even gotten to the downright dangerous bits where I scream and shout and want to drag their families to the stake and beat them for the amusement of a watching gallery.
Aside from █, I'm actually a stickler for road rules. I can be █, but I'll still signal and check my blind spots when changing lanes, and I will never tailgate anyone. When other people don't reciprocate, I get very angry, because to me it feels completely disrespectful to me, akin to a slap across the face. Yes, maybe that makes me a hypocrite, flaunting rules while chastising others for breaking them, but this is my personal writing and you can sod off if you don't want to indulge my self serving fantasy for a bit.
To me, it's like someone taking your office stationery without permission, someone openly picking their nose in your presence, or someone taking your pen without your permission to pick their nose with it while staring you in the face. On their own these little things may not mean much, even if they're blatantly disrespectful. And as such maybe it makes sense to some to not get angry at these little incidents. But what does it say about the place you inhabit if the vast majority of people think it's okay to do such things? Doesn't that make you angry at the world, or at least, sad at your own situation for being stuck in such a place? People almost change when they drive, granted some slight anonymity and absent immediate, direct verbal confrontation from others, and just like the internet, some people's assholic side comes out on full display the moment they have that veil to hide behind. My endless anger every day when I drive tells me that Singaporeans are rude, callous, uncultured, stressed, angry, clueless fuckwits by and large, and yes, I inferred all that from a collection of asswipes not signalling to turn in a lane that allows turning and going straight. I inferred that from having multiple cyclists think they have the right of way at a junction, cussing me out loudly enough for me to hear in my insulated car. I inferred that from PMD riders just zooming across zebra crossings without even giving me a glance, or a chance for me to see them and slow down. I inferred that from the 3 or 4 accident sites I see on a daily basis on the job. It gets to me because I know that any of them could have easily been me, no matter how careful or responsible I think I'm being. I inferred that from that time I was stopped at a junction and got rear ended at speed that sent my two passengers to the hospital.
I'm struggling with depression and genuinely wish I could be dead, and even I am more picky about how I want to die and who I want to bring with me. I genuinely cannot fathom the mindset of the general road user here in Singapore and what drives them to be more suicidal than me.
All that anger and dissatisfaction almost comes full circle back to me, because I'm only one person and I can't change the world. Hell, changing myself is difficult enough. Case in point: I wish I could let it go. I wish I could just go with the flow. I wish these small, everyday irritancies don't grate on me as much as they do. I wish I don't feel so angry every day so it stops draining me so much so quickly. I wish I could stop expecting basic fucking courtesy from people, and just accept that I'm poor, have to work to earn a living, and as such I have to swim in the same shit infested sewers with these clown fishes. I get it: every job, no matter how isolated and secluded, has moments like these aplenty. The whole point of a job is that you be of value to others, and to be of value to others, you have to interact with them. Even in a wordless scenario like on the public roads, I get "spoken to" enough to get massively angry. It's not a job thing. It's not a country thing. It's a me thing.
Sometimes I think I'm born in the wrong place, the wrong time, on a wrong planet, or maybe to the wrong species. Sometimes I think I'll never fit in or understand people, and other times I think I truly could be somebody special had I been born into the right circumstances and given some opportunities that played to my strengths. What I'll never know is how people can be okay with other people. I'm sure it's not a me thing. I'm sure it's not a problem exclusive to this job. I'm sure most people working your typical 9–5 hate it and most of their colleagues.
No comments:
Post a Comment