In my rearview mirror I see a woman in her fifties looking in her rearview mirror repeatedly touching her neck with a thin shiny object before wiping the object on the back of her hand. I am curious. We are in a long line in a drive through. What is she doing? And then, to my horror, I realize exactly what she’s doing. She’s plucking one hair after another out of her neck and chin with tweezers and then wiping them on the back of her hand!
Why do people inexplicably forget glass is transparent when they’re in the car?
I want to run back, tap on her window and say, “Lady, I can see you. No one on the planet wants to watch you plucking hairs out of your face, cut us some slack!”
I drove a cab for more than five years in New York City and when you work six 12-hour shifts a week – that’s 72 hours a week on the road folks – you see a lot. I’ve seen people putting on make up, kissing, fucking, a couple of nitwits reading while driving. I saw one schmuck with a magazine taped to his steering wheel. I’ve seen people talking on cell phones. And then, of course, there’s the always stomach-turning image of someone with their finger jammed up their nose to its “armpit”. And then the doubly stomach-turning image of people chowing down on what their finger just dug out of their nose.
Glass is transparent, people. Hold that thought, please.
Peter S. Kahrmann - Est. 1953 