Americans: One hand on the wheel

Did you ever take drivers ed? What is the first thing that you're supposed to do once you get in the car? After, putting on your seatbelt and adjusting your mirrors, yeah we know those. What I'm referring to is that you are supposed to put BOTH HANDS ON THE WHEEL. Hold onto this thought because it's the theme for this post.

Anyways, I drive about an hour from home to work and then another from work to home. I get to see plenty of people driving alongside me. And just like any other nosy American, I watch other people. And many people drive with one hand or maybe half a hand firmly on the wheel. And not even close to the 9 and 3 positions. And, yes I do it myself too.

Well, first I thought about the reasons why we were all told in driver's ed to put both hands on the wheel. The reason: incase you need to manuever quickly, especially in the case of an emergency situation or one that could quickly become an emergency. I once saw this internet video of a guy in his car driving with one hand on the wheel and no seatbelt. Of course the video wouldn't have been interesting if he didn't get into an accident, so he did. Yikes. No blood, but you could see how he desperately tried to manuever around his then potential accident with one hand (not very well mind you) before he finally was hit and thrown into the back seat after slamming around the cabin of the car. Hopefully he survived.

So we're supposed to keep our hands on the wheel and our belts buckled. Not because we're planning on getting into an accident, but because it just may happen. Observing the driving behavior of fellow Americans I was thinking that most of the time we are lulled into a false sense of security that would convince us to only put on hand one the wheel and forget to put on our seatbelt.

If you can't tell, this is not just about putting both hands on the wheel while driving. It's more about an American mind-set that's got us all convinced that we're on the good ride and that everything is only going to get better. Being part alarmist myself, I find it hard to buy into this way of thinking for long, although it does get to me sometimes. There are plenty of issues that confront us as a global neighborhood that put us at great risk to ignore. These issues range from the depletion of the world's supply of oil (which by the way is what our economy runs on and how we get our food), environmental issues (global warming, pollution), and stuff like the cost of government, medicare and medical insurance. And lets not forget personal choices too like racking up personal dept, avoiding saving, eating poorly, and bad choices on sex and relationships. And this is not an exhaustive list. Hopefully you can see how the act of taking our hands off the wheel indicates the thoughts going through our minds.

We're all convinced that we are invincible. The majority thinking of USAmerica must be the equivalent of an 18 years old kid who's got it made and never thinks he's going to die. I know that things in American are great, their awesome, and I wouldn't want to live anywhere else in the world. However, we need to be thinking about the future in a manner that makes sense, being politically, financially, morally and personally responsible in the decisions we make for today and the future. In addition, we need to have more concern for the global community that we live in. Let's not forget stuff like the fact that the average age of a civilization is 200 years old and we have only just passed this very meager benchmark. What America needs now is an attitude of diligence and desire with awareness for the unknown ahead. We need to put our seatbelt back on, get both hands on the wheel, and start looking at how much gas is in the tank and preparing for the road ahead by watching out for our passengers and all those commuting around us.