Driven nuts...

Well, I'm back in Baltimore. Drove down today in my dad's minivan. I'm hoping the truck gets fixed quickly, so I can drive back up to NJ and swap vehicles. I don't want to take any time off from work, so I'm not going to be able to get up there until the first weekend after it's done. Since my dad's recovering from surgery and my mom is retired, they don't really need the van, but I'd still like to get it back to them ASAP.

Before my accident a few days ago, I guess I was a careless driver. I'd had a few minor scrapes, but nothing big enough to involve insurance or get a ticket.

Now I'm a different kind of driver, and I think it's even worse. I'm a nervous driver. I'm scared shitless while I drive. Every time a car gets close to me, I flinch. Every time I come to a stop sign, I get nervous. I guess it will get better - I did seem better the second half of my trip back compared to the first part.

But the fact is, when we drive, we convince ourselves of a lie - that we aren't doing something potentially dangerous, something that could end our lives or someone else's in a matter of seconds. Usually it doesn't. But often, it's close. If we didn't see that car pull out in front of us or wait a few seconds after that light turned green, we could have been in a mess of twisted metal instead of continuing on our way. Normally, we don't think about that while we drive, and that's not a bad thing - it keeps us sane. It's like not looking down while climbing a ladder - if we ignore reality, we can continue. But the minute we realize how high we are, we start panicing.

As I said, I'm sure at some point I'll become more confident. The trick is to find the balance between confident and careless. I need to find it - I can't have another accident.