Flipping the Bird

For the first time in my life today, I gave somebody the finger while driving.

I have never felt so bad about anything in my life.

As Jessie and I were leaving the pool, I saw a guy with a chair strapped to his back walking towards us with his two cute kids. I remember mentally noting how nice of a smile he had and how he looked like the perfect dad; he looked like the kind of dad I'd want to be. You know how you can just look at some people and part of you already knows them? Some sense that they will have a role to play in your life?

So we come to the intersection at Locante's, and to my left is a black Toyota pickup. We get to the intersection at relatively the same time, and since I had the shorter turn and was on the right, I made the turn before the truck did. I didn't think I was cutting them off, but they honked. For some reason, the honk really shook me, I stuck my left hand out the window and gave them the finger.

The truck didn't do anything else save follow me, and when we came to the next intersection, he pulled up beside us and called out to me. I rolled down the window.

It was the guy with the chair. He looked... hurt. Embarrassed. His voice was strangely innocent. Sympathetic. All he said was, "Hey man, don't give me the finger." The same tone of voice you'd use to
"You didn't need to honk," I said, defensive and prickly, my voice a mixture of indignation and embarrassment. "We got there at the same time."
"No we didn't," he said.
"You just scared me when you honked. You scared me."

And then he gave me this look that I can't describe, as though in that moment he could see me for the lower man that I am, and suddenly I realized that it was the father from the pool. His little children must've been sitting next to him, looking up at him, and he was teaching them how to be a real man. He must've recognized Jessie and I from the pool, too, because he said nothing further. The light changed, and he drove off.

After I dropped Jessie off, I drove around Mt. Lebanon for twenty minutes, frantically searching for his truck. I didn't find it.

I don't have it in me. I just... don't. Maybe someday I'll grow up to be like him.