Driving Drunk.

I have noticed over about five years, while I have been driving, that I have seen drivers in front of me going from left to right when they should have been going in a straight line. For about a year I was puzzled, as I didn’t know why, they were driving in this strange way. I thought, if I was a policeman I would have stopped the driver and did a breath test.

Then one day, I realized what they were doing, they were avoiding potholes in the road. Some small cars were even avoiding the small police bumps, or sleeping policeman, the ones that don’t go all across the road, from left to right, but those, that are a yard wide.

As I have a seven-seater car, I drive over everything, potholes, and sleeping policemen, for the sleeping policemen, I slow down a bit but potholes I don’t notice.

My brother William, has a car, that is lower to the ground than my car, and he told me, “In my car, I can feel everything on the road,” For me, that was an eyeopener. It made me realize, maybe that is why some drivers swerve to the left or the right, instead of going straight.

It also made me think, these drivers must be looking on the road, with their eyes down, instead of looking straight ahead, for when I am driving, I am looking at the car ahead, and traffic that might spring out from a side road, and hit me! That was exactly, how my other seven-seater was written off, from a man pulling out from a side street and I ploughed into him. I thought I was about to kill him, as we both stared wide-eyed into each other. I am still waiting for my counselling, that I was granted and promised, from that car accident.

So, it is not potholes that I look out for, but other car drivers on the road, pedestrians, the possibility of cats running across the road, bikes and motorcycles.

That was until recently, I noticed the car in front of me, went to the left, and I looked and I was shocked to see a manhole, that looked like it was 3” deep! It did not look safe at all. I went over it, for I didn’t have enough time to go around it, but since then, I have gone around it too. It is dangerous and for a person on a bicycle, it could be deadly.

I have also noticed, one of the sleeping policeman, has an unusual dip, it was not there before, this is not good for my car, I’m gonna use the word suspension, but I don’t know if that is the right word, but it is not good, sadly I am unable to avoid going over it. It is on the stretch of road, where we have to give way to traffic and further down the road, they have to give way to us, all the way to the bottom. The road narrows where the speed bump is.

We pay our road taxes, the roads should be good, not bad, they should be sorted, but that has been the bane of car drivers for ……..ever!

I am glad, I have been able to learn from other car drivers to avoid potholes in the road, the little ones don’t bother me, but the big ones do.

Keep safe all. x