My name is Jason, and I’m a victim of road rage.

On Saturday, as I was driving to church (church!), a male in his thirties in a minivan backed out of a driveway directly into the path of my oncoming Jeep.  So what did your friendly blogger do?  He passed him, so as to avoid killing him.  Right decent of me, I think.

My kindness earned me an assault of the most bizarre kind.  See, the road upon which we traveled was zoned as “no passing,” but to avoid hitting the minivan, I had to pass him.  Not the worst thing in the world, since there was no oncoming traffic.  But I guess I hit a nerve with this guy, who sped up, blew a stop sign, and cut me off at a choke point along the road.  He then exited his vehicle, ran up to me, and started screaming about me passing him in a no-passing zone.

Well, I’m one of those strange people who gets very calm and rational in the face of aggression.  Whenever people blow up in my face, my mind clears and I become almost tranquil.  So I very gently reminded the angry man that, in fact, he pulled out in front of me.  At which he became even more angry — apparently, the fact that he didn’t bother to look for oncoming traffic means that I must’ve been going at least 40 in a 25 zone.  Why those numbers?  Don’t ask me.  I was too busy watching his spittle coat my window to focus on his math.

OK.  Guy in a minivan with a horrible case of road rage.  I can deal with that.  What astonished me, however, was the behavior of those present for the adventure.  Two other vehicles served as effective barriers, boxing me in place, while the occupants simply observed the encounter.  A second minivan, which was nearly sideswiped by the road-rage guy, also simply sat there while the nut was screaming at me.  One shudders to imagine how supine my fellow travelers would have been if the road-rage guy were an Islamist terrorist with a bomb.  Would they have watched in silent fascination as he carefully armed his suicide fanny pack?