Now before any person reading this article starts hunting for my address and gets her shotgun out (thank goodness guns are not that easily available in Ireland), read the article carefully. It is not meant to offend or upset anyone, but think about the lighter side of it. I just read the ‘Castlebar on the move’ thread on the BB and remembered I had written this piece. As my tutor tells me, I am a bully… So maybe I am just proving him right, but in the nicest possible way.
Driving on the roads of Ireland can be an experience in itself. The rules of the road are quite simple, but it does seem that many drivers have a problem with them. I can not understand where the lack on knowledge comes from – or is it just a specific rules that we chose to ignore?
Being a woman driver myself, I tend to protect and support any woman against the verbal and often visual assault of other drivers, but there is a limit. I am sure that many of my co-drivers would support the fact that women are judged to be better drivers as shown by the insurance researchers. I now hear all the men I interviewed stating that the only reason women have less accidents is that men have better reflexes and can avoid woman driver, thus saving them from themselves. Yeah Right!
There is one definite factor to consider: roundabouts and lady drivers don’t mix. The idea of giving traffic, approaching from the right, the right of way seems to elude them. I am generalising now and might be a touch unfair to those who manage that concept, but come now ladies, just because you choose to ignore the oncoming traffic, does not mean they are not there. It is quite a simple rule; "Moving objects from the RIGHT, have right of way". Has the screech of tyres never woken you up from your heavenly slumber? Usually you drive into the circle; eyes glued to the nose of your car, the safety in knowing that if you don’t see them they will not be there. Material objects do not just vanish on request. You find yourself interrupted by those nasty people who wake you with blowing horns and screeching tyres. It would be a good idea to remember blowing horns and screeching tyres could have a metallic outcome.
To top this stunt, once the offending driver has been woken up of course, they give either a friendly "so sorry" wave or a "what?!" Look. I wonder if that could be an acceptable excuse for the insurance companies. The lady driver was very friendly and "so sorry", therefore she should not be the guilty party and the horrible person who collided with her right fender should be punished severely. Now I am taking the Mickey out of this situation, but it’ better to laugh, than develop a headache. To avoid a collision, calm down and thank your lucky stars that your reflexes have worked well once again: no need for Road Rage.
This reminds me of a game my daughter used to play when she was rather little. She used to close her eyes and think we could not see her. Is this something that stays with some of our drivers? At times I can’t believe that this grown person had actually, purposely (maybe), driven in front of me without even looking at her victim.
Come on ladies, we can do better than that, we are able to overcome that problem, and we owe it to ourselves not to give the opposite sex any leeway… so lets just give this Roundabout problem a go and show them how it is done… we can do it…. We raise children for goodness sake and what could be more difficult than that?
Copyright Celia Anderson Author
