Why Would You DO This?

            Hello once again. I hope everyone’s having a peaceful Labor Day weekend. Here in Illinois it’s rained for much of the weekend, and while I don’t usually like rain, the mid-west has needed it badly. Delaney and I have been home for exactly three weeks, and she’s settled in nicely. Most of the last three weeks have been spent getting her settled in. On the humorous side of things, I was charged a $13 “new patient fee” at my vet clinic to establish her medical file there. I pointed out that I’d been there with Rudy, my first guide dog, and so, I asked, should I really be charged this fee? “Oh, Sir,” replied the very kind lady at the desk, “you’re not the patient. That’s Delaney.” “But I’m the one paying the fee,” I reasoned. “True,” she said, “but we call you the client. But Delaney is our patient.” ...... One of those interesting moments. Finally, Delaney has taken to Nicole without any troubles. Nicole has, naturally, adopted her.

            I have some blogs planned for the coming weeks, and I look forward to writing them, but first I want to ask you to think with me about texting. Texting is, of course, nothing new, and there’s a lot that could be said about it. First, my own credentials on the subject. As a blind person, I came to texting rather late in the game. Only when I got the Samson Convoy through Verizon did I start to text. It’s convenient for some things, and I keep it as one mode of communication if not necessarily my main means of staying in touch. Now I have an iPhone. The jury’s still out on that one. So, I’ve become more and more aware of the texting culture, for lack of a better term.

            The issue on my mind today came to the for when I read this in a friend’s Facebook status:

If you ever walk behind someone who's texting, you'll discover that not only do they walk VERY slowly, but they have the magical ability to sense which side you're trying to pass them on. They slowly drift in that direction, cutting off any escape, so you have no choice but walk behind them and endure their horribly slow pace and ignorant button-mashing. I bet that 70% of all instances of lateness for faculty and students at UNCG are caused by text-walkers.
AND ANOTHER THING: Have you ever been run into head-on by a text-walker? It's not fun. Just as they can sense anyone trying to pass behind them, they can sense anyone trying to maneuver around them from the front. And with their eyes fixed on their phones all the while, they will mirror your steps until they run into you. This collision, no matter what you did to try and prevent it, is entirely your fault. You know this because their eyes suddenly jolt back up to real life to meet yours in a dirty, accusing glare. In some cases, they harshly remind you to watch where you're going, which suffuses the situation with irony, but unfortunately does nothing for your bruised body, splashed coffee, or trampled toes. You keep walking, with an injured body and injured pride, and hope that they soon walk right into a brick wall.

These comments—and here I’ve only included a portion of what she had to say—make me ask the question once again, are sighted people that stupid? I’ve been in more than one car where the driver insisted on texting while driving, and I have been hit by distracted walking texters. How did I know they were texting? You can hear the click of the buttons as their thumbs wear themselves out. Plus, there’s just a certain dazed air to these people. If they’re not high, not listening to their iPods and not sobbing hysterically, yet they still seem dazed and not quite there when they hit you, they’re probably texting. I’ve been hit by pedestrians and have had several close calls with bicyclists on my campus.

Where does the word ‘stupid’ come into it, you ask? Am I not being a bit too harsh? I think ‘stupid’ is a perfectly justifiable word because these people are dangerous. To make my point, let’s increase the speed of the texters and talk about them in their cars. If you’re talking on your cell while in the car, you probably have a hands-free set, at least these days. Failing all else, you can cradle the phone between your neck and shoulder and keep your eyes on the road. Texting, however, requires you to take at least one eye, possibly both, off the road for up to 5 seconds at a time while you read and reply to the message, the amount of time it takes to drive the length of a football field. How many crashes have there been, not to mention people killed in crashes, that were directly caused by some putz having his or her eyes glued to their phone while they distractedly cruised through an intersection? Legal experts and insurance companies disagree, but it’s in the thousands at the very least and those are just the ones that get reported.

We all know about the instinct for self-preservation. It’s the instinct that makes you want to run or hide when you here gunshots nearby, or it’s the instinct you have to overcome in order to run into a burning building and save a helpless victim. Obviously, it’s less well-honed in quite a number of individuals. Texting while moving, whether in a car, on your bike or your own two feet, has never made sense to me. The first time I heard about it I thought, surely only a handful of very foolish people do this dumb thing. Apparently I was being an optimist. My question is ‘why.’ Why would it occur to you that it’s ok to get into extended text chats while driving your date to dinner or your kids to school? Why do you glare at me, as my friend’s comments above suggest, when you plough into me? It’s your own fault.

The only answer I can find that makes any sense at all is wrapped up in our cultural notion of invincibility. People think, “not to me,” “over there, but not here,” “it’ll happen to that guy, but not me.” This is very youth-like thinking, but it’s not just our teens and young adults that are guilty of it. If it were, I could say that it’s something people grow out of. That, however, does not appear to be the case.

As a blind person I feel myself at greater risk here. I don’t have the option of offering to let me drive if your conversation is that important. I have to either leave your car or take your phone out of your hand. End of options. I haven’t had to do either of these yet, but remember that cab drivers are like anyone else and prone to do it. I know of a driver who wrecked her cab—fortunately without a customer inside—because she didn’t stop in time. She was, guess what, texting while driving. So, this is a practice I have no patience with.

Do I sound irritated? Shouldn’t  I be? I’m always the passenger, and someone’s irresponsibility with their texting not only endangers them—something they’re perfectly free to do at their own risk, this being America—but it puts me at risk. No thanks. I don’t have a tidy solution here. I know that states all over the country are trying to curb this phenomenon. Fort Lee New Jersey has made it illegal to text and walk, the penalty being a $85 ticket. In that state it’s also illegal to text or use a cell phone while driving. In light of these laws, I suppose my point is that they shouldn’t be necessary. Texting while walking or driving is so obviously dangerous that, if just one or two people did it, we could dismiss it and say, “they were just being stupid.” Well, if a whole country is doing it, they’re still being stupid, and personally, I don’t want to pay for someone else’s inattention by being run down in the street by a distracted, texting driver. No thanks.