Fred Aiken Writing

It felt like a dare no one asked of me.

I can’t say that the impulse to not wear a seatbelt came out of nowhere. As a child I would always try to get around wearing one because it chaffed my neck and left an uncomfortable nylon residue.

My parents bought the most economic option when they went car shopping: used cars. I don’t have anything against buying used cars. In fact, I’ve only ever owned used cars. But ultimately, the seatbelt you put on has all the sweat, bodily fluids, and various other debris of whatever other drivers came before you. No matter how much it is cleaned.

But that’s not the entire reason. To be honest, I probably wouldn’t wear a seatbelt in a new car either.

I especially would never buy a new car since all the new models tend to have a feature that doesn’t allow you to drive without you putting on the seatbelt. Either that or it will have the most annoying dashboard beeping sound until the seatbelt is finally clicked.

Nor can I really say that seatbelts are all that constrictive. I mean, they kinda are. But after a while I can get comfortable if I really concentrate by not focusing on the chaffing.

If I’m being honest, and I think you know that I’m not, it’s because I hate the rhyming campaign law enforcement started using: Click it or ticket.

It sounds like a Mother Goose rhyme, but with legal consequences. 

I have this overwhelming impulse to ignore it.

When I get pulled over, I just subtly pull my seatbelt over my chest. The police officer can never tell that I didn’t have it on to begin with. They’re lying if they say that they can. Their dashboard cameras are of questionable quality. If I were to be taken to court, though I never have been, at least not over the issue of my seatbelt, then I’d ask the judge to review the body camera of the officer that pulled me over, to which someone in the court would say there is no body cameras on our officers because of budget cuts or something along those lines, and I could scream out about the injustice of my persecution or subtly mention how civil servants aren’t paid nearly enough nor given the correct resources to effectively do their job, and low and behold the matter is settled. At least I think so. Like I said, I’ve never been to court over my lack of wearing a seatbelt.

On occasion, though, and it’s not very often that this occurs, but on occasion I start to slowly pick up speed. First five miles over the limit, then ten, twenty, and so on and so forth. When I hit a hill it’s even better. I don’t hit the break. I keep tapping the gas. Picking up speed. Pull down the windows. The wind lashes violently through my car, against my face, to the point where it’s a little difficult to keep my eyes open completely.

Then I start to nudge onto the other side of the road. At first, there’s no one there. There never is anyone on the road around here. But eventually another motorist climbs around the corner, probably going the speed limit, though probably a little over themselves. Maybe even contemplating the same game I am.

When the other driver sees me, they give a courteous honk to notify me that I’m on the wrong side of the road.

I ignore them.

They honk again. This time bearing down on the horn longer. Slightly more passive aggressive. Hell, I don’t know what I’m saying, they’re probably being as aggressive as possible. Cursing me out. Flipping me off. Calling me whatever names they can think of despite knowing I can’t hear them. I don’t know what they’re saying.

And I ignore them.

Then the other driver starts to swerve themselves. They think maybe they need to think about getting onto the other side of the road just to avoid me. But something subconsciously tells them not to. Perhaps it’s that little lawyer cricket chirping in everyone’s head at all hours, day and night; ‘That’s illegal, you can’t do that.’ So, they wait for me to get back into my rightful, lawful, responsible position.

I ignore them.

They come to the conclusion that I’m either drunk or high or both. Maybe I want to kill myself. Maybe I want to take them out with me. Maybe they have a mild or major racist/sexist/homophobic, ageist, classist thought, like I’m Asian, or maybe female Asian, or maybe a gay female Asian too poor to fix my car, and too old to fix my eyes. They hate themselves. But they hate me more.

They’re going to die with me, and the last thought they had was incredibly offensive. Does that make them horrible? Have they always been horrible? Can they change, and if so would it matter in the last brief moments of their life.

But then we miss each other. In the game of chicken, I always chicken out.

It feels almost generous to give the other driver and myself another chance at life.

Perhaps the reason the other driver didn’t swerve much earlier was because they themselves wanted to die. They harbored some deep seeded personal issue or trauma, and my little act of chaos was helping.

Yet the more we drove from each other, the more we each realized that I never had the intention of actually helping them kill themselves. I never had the intention of killing myself.

Not seriously, anyway.

Not serious enough, as it goes.

Though perhaps one day I will be driving without my seat belt on, minding my own business on the right side of the road, and then another sans-seat-belt driver will drift ever slightly to my side. The closer they get the more apparent it becomes that we’re going to collide. I have horrible reflexes, so I just know we’re going to make contact.

For the first time I’ll meet someone else that doesn’t like to wear seatbelts, and we’ll bond, so to speak.