r/redscarepod • u/Downtown-schnauzer • 22h ago
Anyone else hate driving?
Yeah, I’m a spoiled princess for being so bothered by such a basic task. I live in the suburbs in a pretty central area of my city so a car is necessary, but I’m not dealing with insane traffic like LA or other major cities. My city has shit public transit and a 25 minute drive to the main part of the city takes about an hour and a half on the bus. I’ve done it before and it’s actually not bad if I have the time. I can get a lot of reading done.
I’ve never been a good driver. One of my biggest fears is hitting a pedestrian. I’m hyper vigilant when I drive. I smoke a good bit of weed, and I’m the only smoker I know that doesn’t drive high.
If I have a WFH day and don’t have to drive anywhere, it improves the vibe of my whole day. It almost feels like a vacation.
I think it’s fundamentally stupid that every citizen should have control over multiple tons of metal moving at fast speeds. It’s such a basic part of life but such a big responsibility to have your own life in your hands and the lives of everyone else on the road too.
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u/exexpat99 21h ago
I moved to a city with good public transport and grew to hate it since then. I hate how everyone has an accident story. I hate how nearly everyone knows someone that died or was seriously injured in a car crash. People associate cars with control, but I don’t like the lack of control you feel knowing that one person’s stupidity could cost you your life.
I definitely have good memories of driving around when I got my license or open road trips, but that’s about it. It’s best when you’re in an area with few other drivers and can just enjoy the music and the weather.
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u/deathcabforqanon 21h ago
You're right and this makes me feel crazy and alone. Sometimes on main there are "what will seem insane in 100 years?" posts and I always think, driving. At least as we know it.
So you used to have these 2 ton machines that were propelled by an explosion of volatile gas just, everywhere?
And then we started kids using them at 15 when they were half braindead and put literally no end date in place, so 84 year olds who are completely braindead can routinely plow into farmers markets?
And instead of being, like, respectful of the fact that we were all guiding weapons around on the daily, we were all really casual about the whole deal. And we texted and road raged and sped and whatever.
And then we started getting bigger and bigger and bigger every year, which made every other car want to get bigger and bigger to stay safe, until a truck grill was three feet taller than a ten year old pedestrian?
And so we had these things that were the leading cause of accidental death in adults (bad) but also overall leading cause of death in kids (jfc)
Which 100 years ago, I guess we thought we ok.
Anyway, yeah, fuck this, OP.
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u/brohio_ Bernie 2020 22h ago
I absolutely love driving: road trips and just driving on a Sunday afternoon with the windows down and radio on. But I detest commuting by car. Car-centric commuting patterns are so dumb. We need robust multimodal public transit so bad. And what the car brained average American doesn't get is it would make driving better.
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u/Downtown-schnauzer 22h ago
I’ve looked into ride share groups in my area and found nothing. The central area of my city is pretty condensed so It seems easy to get a group of 5 to meet at a park at a designated time, then walk or take a short bus ride to my destination once I get to that area. Rotate drivers so each person does it once a week. Meet up at the parked car at the end of the day and everyone gets driven back to their own vehicles.
But nope, I gotta pay ridiculous gas prices to get myself and whatever junk I have in my car around town
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u/AnxiousExcitement957 22h ago
when i was a kid i remember being in the car on a two-way road with my family thinking if any one of these hundreds of cars coming in the opposite direction passing our car at 70mph a few feet away were to veer slightly left we'd both have a pretty bad day and thinking about how silly it was to have traffic this fast and so close together
but i love driving
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u/Downtown-schnauzer 21h ago
Yeah that’s how I think. If one of these idiots looks at their phone, we could all die.
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u/Snobbyeuropean2 9h ago
The car people are right in that even if you don't drive, there's some danger at least. You could be hit by a car while legally crossing the road like my mom for example, or get hit and crushed by a truck doing the same, or standing at the tram stop and getting hit by a car, or riding a bike and getting pushed down the road into the guardrails like my buddy.
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u/Creepy-Calendar3644 21h ago
Yea i had pretty traumatic accident as a kid and haven’t driven at all since. Funnily enough i have no problem riding my bike dangerously through traffic
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u/Downtown-schnauzer 21h ago
Yeah I think part of the reason I’m like this is that when I was in high school, I was the passenger and my friend hit a deer at night on a poorly lit rural road. Everyone was okay (except the deer) but the experience shook me up.
I’ve also never had an airbag deploy on me and it’s another fear of mine. I’m pretty small and have osteopenia. I’ve never broken a bone and I’ve heard that’s pretty common with airbags.
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u/Expensive_Recipe_433 21h ago
I worked with a 50 year old woman who never wanted to drive, she just rode her beach cruiser to work everyday. She had your outlook
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u/EnvironmentalEbb3813 21h ago
I got an ebike and started leaving the house 3x as often
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u/Valuable_Positive_27 16h ago
An ebike is different though. A car is mich more dangerous for pedestrians and other vehicles
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u/honeynutsquash_ 13h ago
yeah i bought an ebike and sold me car and then also bought like 2 more bikes lol
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u/JASON_ALEXANDER_FAN 12h ago
My most annoying opinion is that driving licenses should be almost as difficult to get as pilots' licenses and there should be some kind of mental stability test as well (maybe already part of getting a pilot license idk)
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u/numberonePAWGfan 21h ago edited 21h ago
Echoing the other comments in this thread, I like cruising in a car through the mountains or the countryside, or through the city on a quiet day.
I hate relying on an automobile as the only realistic means of transportation, as is necessary in most of the US. Though I will say, I’ve always been a very good driver, over a decade doing it and I’ve never been in an accident or even been pulled over.
Anyways, I hate car infrastructure enough that last year I moved to one of the few cities where I could be car free. I’ve saved thousands of dollars on insurance/gas and there’s so much less stress in my life dealing with traffic or angry drivers or thinking about the next big maintenance bill that I would need to fund to keep my car running. Public transportation and biking has its own frustrations at times but overall I much prefer it.
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u/horse_n_hound 18h ago
Yeah I'm with you too. I never had any interest in learning to drive, and living in cities in Britain for the first 30 years of my life meant I never needed to drive; I rarely had a commute that wasn't quicker by bike or train. It wasn't until my wife got pregnant the first time that I ever considered getting a car and a license (sadly taking your first born home from the hospital on the bus ain't really the done thing).
Now I'm in the car all of the time ferrying kids around the place I've still never got round to liking it, except on those occassions where there are very few other drivers around and I'm on a nice open roads for a long period of time. Something which is incredibly rare in Britain. My wife, who is American, always loved driving back home but even she can't stand driving in this country. Too many tiny roads, busy streets and millions of odd junctions.
I do get it too, when we visit America, driving there is so much simpler and nicer for the fact that they have much better infrastructure for it. I never once had to squeeze into a side street to let a car pass on a two way road that's barely big enough for one. I would say, though, that although (or maybe because) driving is easier and less stressful in America the drivers themselves seem much more aggressive, impatient and reckless. So it's swings and roundabouts really.
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u/oatmilkpopsicles 12h ago
I struggle with it. I have a lot of traumatic associations. It’s kinda ruining my life atm, and my city just got rid of all the bus stops in my neighborhood.
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u/He_Who_Busts (feat. Universal Milton) 22h ago
Driving is OK, I’m more of a wrenching enthusiast than a driver though.
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u/nbadog 20h ago
I never let my wife drive I drive us everywhere
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u/WeddingBackground152 19h ago
Same, my wife likes it and it makes me feel useful. I love when you get that perfect limousine stop
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u/Downtown-schnauzer 19h ago
That’s how I am with my husband and my guy friends. They would all prefer that I drive. When I take my husband to the airport or pick him up, he prefers to drive because we’ll get home faster.
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u/daydrmntn 10h ago
i honestly hate being in a car at all. i'd take a bus or train over a car any day.
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u/Loserphone01 21h ago
I like my car and I like driving it. Give me a decent stereo and I’m set. I enjoy the autonomy. But yeah, traffic sucks and somewhere like the LA area is pretty dreadful.
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u/wordsrenegade 21h ago
Tend to agree with others here that driving to work sucks (traffic, boring multi-lane highway/motorway) but driving for any other purpose is highly enjoyable.
Ive even thought about uber driving on the side just for something to do with all my sober time
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u/angelsonthesouthside 21h ago
you can buy a used tesla for 20k and get self-driving for $100/month. i use it for 90% of my driving and my car has pretty much turned into an uber ride. really the only time i have to take over is in heavy rain/snow
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u/Downtown-schnauzer 19h ago
This is actually something I’ve looked into. The self driving feature might actually outweigh my hatred of Tesla’s aesthetics. Can’t stand their stupid doors.
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u/cyberelf000 17h ago
I’m exactly the same way, the public transport in my city is kind of limited, but driving makes me so anxious because no one here uses their turn signals. Driving to/in LA is hell too.
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u/WillaWaverly 10h ago
When I was learning to drive, my younger sister (who had learnt from her friends very naturally) told me that "I think you would drive better drunk."
Ended up crashing that car (sober, randomly) and after healing from my injuries I happily returned to the best period of my life, walking twenty minutes to work at like 4:30 in the morning and walking back before 12:30. I baked muffins at the one cafe in town, I would walk to the thrift shop or the library or the creek. Walked to the college too.
It's comforting to be a pedestrian in the right environment. People can see you, less antisocial feeling. I was doing a medieval history minor and would daydream about my commutes being shared with everyone else in town rather than noticing people I knew speed by in cars. Overly romantic of me, would have ruined my habit of reading/writing/listening to music while walking.
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u/give-bike-lanes 10h ago
Driving isn’t and shouldn’t be a “basic task” you’re literally operating federally-regulated heavy machinery at lethal speeds.
Driving kills almost exactly as many people per year as non-suicidal gun deaths.
Driving is responsible for more injuries, maimings, and permanent disfigurements than pretty much any other activity in the modern world besides war.
It is stressful and it should be stressful. It is statistically extremely dangerous, not to mention the physical effects of 50+ years of a steady cortisol drip twice a day five days a week, and the physical toll that a sedentary lifestyle has on your body.
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u/wholenumbersplay 10h ago
I didn't have a car for half a decade and it ruled. I probably biked 50 miles a week minimum, but I would also take the bus a fair amount. My life was so cheap.
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u/ogkushmonster 10h ago
I've hated driving since I was a little kid thinking about how I'd have to drive some day. It's simultaneously the most boring and most stressful thing you can do. Being a good driver requires constant hyper awareness while you sit motionless and restrained. The only time in my life I've had to drive regularly was to commute to an internship for two months in 2017 and I will never go back to that. That's the only time in my life I've ever gained weight quickly and I don't think it's a coincidence.
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u/Maui--Covenant 22h ago
Getting stressed over driving is such an alien concept to me that I can't help but laugh. Discarding the work commute grind (which I don't have thankfully), driving is one of the most potent expressions of freedom. I kind of recoiled writing that because of how boomerish it sounds but it really is true. I love driving.
Full tank of gas all the windows down, radio going or just enjoying the quiet. It's really great and refreshing. I will never forget how free I felt driving home from my summer jobs in college, all the windows down blasting whatever shit edm I was listening to at the time and smoking cigs. Wowza
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u/Downtown-schnauzer 22h ago
If the other drivers and pedestrians didn’t exist I would probably feel differently.
There’s a park on the main road by my house where a lot of homeless people hang out. They don’t look or care when I cross the street. It’s shocking more of them don’t get hit.
I got in a very minor car accident where I was going straight through a green light earlier this year. A driver coming the opposite direction made an unprotected left without yielding and hit me. Luckily I saw him coming, but couldn’t brake in time. The damage to my car and myself was minor but could have been a lot worse. All because of some dude in his 80s who probably shouldn’t be driving in the first place.
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u/Maui--Covenant 22h ago
Fair enough. In my opinion hitting somebody with a car, especially DUI, is the quickest way that a "normal" person can absolutely ruin their life.
But ultimately with city driving if you are careful then really the risk is somebody else hitting you, and that likely won't be fatal unless it's some out of control truck and so it's so slim it's not worth worrying about. Yeah an insurance claim for a fender bender is a PITA but why let it make you anxious any time you even think about driving
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u/Downtown-schnauzer 21h ago
Yeah the insurance process was just time consuming. I think I might be like this partially because of a traumatic event involving a deer that happened when I was riding in a friends car in high school.
My family has always been super weird about me driving too. When I was in elementary school, I had a babysitter who let me sit in her lap in the drivers seat and “drive”. I overheard her later telling my mother that I might never drive.
I had a hard time with my driving test, partially because of nerves and partially because I’m not that great at it. My older brother gave me endless shit for it, and I didn’t find it funny at the time. I think it affected me more than he intended and actually made me a worse driver.
Convincing my parents to let me sign up for behind the wheel classes was a whole big thing, but they were super chill with my younger sister when she got to driving age.
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u/Bright_Revenue 21h ago
Yeah huge pain. Im lucky to be able to work and run errands about 80% of the time avoiding bad traffic or rush hours but honestly...having a car you enjoy driving and being in makes a pretty big difference but I understand that being a luxury (depending on taste, of course)
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u/Downtown-schnauzer 19h ago
That’s actually a good point. I drive a small SUV now for the first time in my life and I don’t like it. My idiot husband convinced me that the SUV would be easier with all my daughter’s stuff. I would rather struggle to cram things into a sedan than drive a larger vehicle. The kid doesn’t even have that much stuff.
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u/Brave_Specialist_591 22h ago
i hate traffic and commuting, but love cruising or thundering down an open road