**I wrote this four weeks before I quit my job. I read it again for the first time after writing it on my last day**
On Flooring Yellow Lights
I’ve started flooring yellow lights lately and I have to say, I kind of like it.
Back up. I know how that sounds. In fact, I know it’s illegal to floor it when the light turns yellow. Hear me out, proceed with caution, and understand that regardless of metaphor, you should never take driving advice from somebody who lives in California.
I am not an aggressive driver by nature. On the highways, I used to consistently drive under the speed limit before I moved to California. I’ve turned slightly more aggressive (ok a bit more than slightly) since moving to Southern California because it’s a dog eat dog world on the 405, but my basic driving instincts remain the same. When driving on the highway, if I don’t have somewhere to be, I really just enjoy the ride. In fact, a passenger yelled at me the other day asking if I could at least go 75. I don’t mind going slower on the highway as long as I’m not the asshole in the left lane holding everybody up. Driving (not in traffic) is fun. Driving is much more of a journey, an experience than a mode of transportation. I like driving.
On the other hand, what drains the living soul out of me is the stop and start monotony of street traffic. Here in California, I take side roads quite often to avoid the sludge of horribly maintained lanes and distracted drivers that comprise the 405. However, this can be even more disheartening when you encounter the misfortune of hitting literally every. single. red. light. Nobody cares about where they’re going because they know they won’t get there anytime soon. This stop-start, stop-start turns the best of us into one of two types of people: assholes and zombies. On a normal day, despite my best efforts, I become just another driving bot with a resigned from on my face. Sometimes I yell and other times I yell more.
All of that has been changing lately, much like my perspective on traffic lights. I don’t mean for this to sound cliché or gimmicky, it’s just true. And as a writer, I typically like to find a solid metaphor for my existential processes. Or maybe I’m just looking for a way to justify my objectively illegal driving behavior.
I’m fairly certain we all experience that moment of hesitation when we see the light turn yellow. Most of us completely remove our foot from both gas and the brake, choosing instead to let it hover in limbo, between petals. Do I punch the gas or stop? Our foot doesn’t have a brain, so it doesn’t know instinctually which one to choose. Instead, no decision becomes the decision. By the time your brain decides whether you should risk it or not, you’ve likely entered the danger zone where if you punch it, you could face getting a ticket and if you decide to stop, the law of inertia will probably make a mess out of the objects inside of your car.
So, I’ve just started to accelerate with the intention of training my foot to do so on instinct. Green = Go. Yellow = Go. Red = Stop. I’ve just started rewriting the canals of my brain to stop hesitating.
I am on the brink of doing something amazing in my life. I don’t know what that is, I can just feel it. I’m sure I don’t have to try and explain. When you know, you know you know. I think our conscious often functions like our driving foot. Faced with the option to step on the gas or slow the hell down, we do nothing. We “ahhhh I don’t know what to do” our way through life until we literally crash, face inconvenient consequences, or stop driving entirely. Stepping on the gas is like training yourself to say yes to life. On instinct.
That’s what I’m doing. I don’t mind taking my time through the journey but I hate the stop and start. It doesn’t get you anywhere. It pisses me off and causes me to hate other drivers who did nothing wrong. I want to go. I’m ready to go.