(no subject)

Mrumph. I can't go anywhere until the building management sends someone over to take car of the dripping (streaming, really) bathtub faucet. We called about it Wednesday, they said they'd send some Thursday morning, but apparently we've been bumped back on the list. I'll call and remind them if no one's here by after lunchtime. I hate being housebound.

I've recently become all right emotionally with something I've been wrestling with for some time. I don't have a driver's licence, for the simple reason that I don't know how to drive. For ages I've been trying to convince myself that I should learn, because, well, *everyone* knows how to drive, right? I've felt immature because of my fear of driving, like I was being silly for avoiding it. I'm afraid of driving for a very simple reason - when I was 6 years old, my parents and I were driving home from the mall on a rainy night. There was a motorcycle in front of us, and I think I recall my dad commenting to my mother that it was driving strangely. Suddenly, it swerved in front of us, and we crashed. My father broke his hand fighting the steering wheel as we spun out, and I came hurtling forward from the backseat (my parents never wore seatbelts, so neither did I. We do now.) Our car slammed into a light pole. We were lucky, and all came out of it all right - I'd just gotten a big bruise on my head, Dads' broken hand was the worst of our injuries. Later I found out the other people weren't so lucky. It turned out the driver of the motorcycle was drunk, and his passenger, a young woman, wasn't wearing a helmet. They found her about 50 yards away - at first people thought it was just a pile of trash blown into the street by the strom. It wasn't. She died three days later, never having woken up. Apparently her brothers hunted down the driver of the motorcycle and beat him so badly he wound up in a persistent vegatative state (I didn't learn that till I was *much* older.)

I'm terrified of driving. I just *can't* convince myself to get behind the wheel of something that could kill someone. I couldn't live with that, and my own experience tells me the chance is just too large, too present. People have inundated me with accident statistics, said it was just bad luck, told me I was overreacting, etc., etc. Finally, I've come to the point where I just don't care - my fear would make me a lousy driver, considering what a high strung passenger it makes me (I sometimes have to cover my eyes during merges, or make squeaky noises when we get cut off too close. Sir is very patient with that.) Finally, I feel like it's not cowardly, or immature. It's just the best choice for me. I'm pleased with that. Besides, it's not like I'm missing out on anything much, except perhaps the chance to drive a shiny purple car with fairy-printed floormats/steering wheel cover. I live in a city that's hell to drive around, enjoy walking, and have always been good at finding public transit options. I'd never be able to live in a place that lacked good public transit, but I wouldn't *want* to, either.

On a different topic, I'll be starting an 8-week course at my yoga studio in two weeks, on using meditation as a way of dealing with/engaging pain, both emotional and physical. I went to the introductory lecture last night - the meditation is the sitting practice I'm already familiar with, but the intention is different. I'm not entirely sure how much I'll get out of it, based on my impressions of the facilitator, but it's only and hour a week, and it's a very good price, so even if it's not a given that I'll be overwhelmed with epiphanies, I've got nothing to lose.