Dear guy going excessively fast on a multipurpose forest road,
I heard you coming a half mile or so away, hum of a well tuned engine, inklings of a dust cloud emerging up around the bend. I was just off the road on a trail when you passed by me. I don’t enjoy running on the road, or riding my bike on the road, or generally being near the road, largely because of people like you. Fortunately for me and the rest of us forest road users, magnificent trail stewards of the forest put in this off-the-road trail to elevate us above your plumes of dust.
I wanted to yell obscenities at you but that wouldn’t have had any effect. Instead, as I often do, I muttered “Slow the fuck down,” and then continued trudging up the trail while the remnants of your particulate matter wafted in my general direction. This retort is my go-to, mostly muttered quietly for my own edification, other yelled out of frustration. All for naught, you speed racers rarely drive these roads with your windows down, and why would you? You wouldn’t want your own dust to infiltrate the sanctum of your vehicle.
Oblivious to all in your path you cruised along at 45 or what have you, easily 20-30 mph higher than the posted speed limit for that stretch of road, windows closed, podcast or Spotify playlist cranked to mask the unseemly bumping of tires on gravel road. The thing I don’t understand, and what I would really like for you to explain is: why? What is the rush? You clearly and deliberately drove your car out into the woods, not down the highway, not to the racetrack…the woods. Something compelled you up that road. And while I know you likely didn’t get too far in that urban sedan of an off-road machine, there must be a purpose of some kind to venturing out here in the first place.
And this mysterious impetus ironically connects the two of us. Something drew both of us out into the forest on a beautiful, sunny, late July day. We share that link and on that level I puzzle at that single connection and the immediate divergence in our approach to wilderness communion, as demonstrated by your complete and utter disregard for everyone else out on the road sharing the same fellowship of the woods with you.
In the end I think that is what truly makes you a colossal asshole. Not just the speeding but the selfish entitlement. The insinuation that not only should you be allowed to use the woods for your desires, but you seemingly own the entitlement to do what you will without the acknowledgement of your fellow human beings. In your mind we either must not exist or the common denominator of our wilderness pursuit does not merit consideration. In that sense brethren of the woods, we are not equals. I am but a blur of scenery outside the comfort of your cockpit.
I certainly hope you got where you were going, and I hope next time our paths don’t cross. Though as long as we both heed that call of the wild, I imagine they inevitably and unfortunately will. Perhaps on that day we’ll stand on equal footing and the only clouds we’ll experience will be those silently floating overhead.
Sincerely,
Jason McRoy
July 2023
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