December 27, 2015
Tis the season to be jolly or maybe a little extra crazy. This “OMG Class Moment!” happened on my way to yoga class the other night. I was in my car, waiting to make a left hand turn from a side street onto a much busier street. It was about 5:30pm, at the height of after work commuter traffic. The side street I was making a left hand turn from was on a hill. In order for me to see if cars were coming from either direction on the busier street, I had to inch out slowly, causing me to be in the crosswalk and slightly in the bike lane. There was no other way for me to safely see if the traffic was coming from either side.
I had been waiting quite some time for the traffic to clear on both sides so I could make my left hand turn. There was no middle turning lane to pull into. Traffic seemed to be especially heavy on this particular evening. During one of my glances to my right, I saw a female pedestrian walking towards my car along the busier street. As she got closer to my car, she started walking faster and directly for me. I waited for her to either walk behind my car or in front of it before I tried making the left hand turn. Instead of doing either, she stomped right up to my passenger side window, cussed at me for being in her way, flipped me the bird and pounded on my window with both of her fists. WTF? Then she walked around to the front of my car, slammed both her palms on the hood of my car. I laid on my horn, flipped the bird right back to her and told her not to touch my car. I figured that was a better reaction then gunning the gas pedal and running her crazy ass over.
I was in shock. I felt violated. How dare she beat on my car, thinking she could get away with it? That’s when I decided to roll down my window, look her in the eye and yell, “F—k you Lady! Merry Christmas!” I have to admit, there were so many better things I could have said in that moment, but for some reason I decided to wish her a Merry Christmas. Seriously? She looked at me and was slightly taken aback. I don’t think she expected me to say that either. She probably had a “WTF?” running through her head as well. The awkward moment quickly passed and the crazy lady was back to yelling at me again about how I needed to move my F–king car out of the crosswalk and bike lane. She then turned around and continued stomping her crazy ass self down the street.
My blood was boiling by the time I got to my yoga studio. Instead of being able to forget about the horrible run-in I had with the crazy lady on my way to class, I dwelled on it. I kept thinking about how I could have handled the situation better. I also couldn’t help but feel ashamed for stooping to the crazy lady’s level by flipping her the bird and yelling back at her. Not only did I have a hard time focusing on holding the postures during class, class seemed more uncomfortably hot than usual AND I had some lady’s feet in my face during the entire floor balancing series. Not exactly the zoned out, blissful, after work yoga class I had been hoping for.