2,200+ students are enrolled in our daughter’s junior high school. Managing drop off and pick up for that many students can be a challenge. Some parents drop off in the horseshoe driveway by the front office. Others, like myself, drop off by the gym in the back. Either location requires patience and cooperation, two things we tend to run short of when we’ve had a rough start at home, or we’re running late, or both.
There are four-way stop signs to negotiate with people who never come to a complete stop and always think they’re next. There is the ebb and flow of yielding and merging, driving all the way to the end of the car line before you stop to let the kids out, giving the faculty a wave of thanks, or at least a quick nod and a smile. This is the dance we do every day in car line.

Today was different. Turning into the back parking lot was smooth. Merging and yielding and gracefully flowing to the drop-off point earned me an A+, at least in my mind. I gave a smile and a wave to the teachers who were helping direct traffic before circling around toward the parking lot exit. I had just one more maneuver to make to get back into the four lanes of school traffic and on my way to a meeting.

As I prepared to turn left, I imagined myself as a running back looking for holes in the line, gaps that I could shoot through, all within the 20mph school zone limit. Sometimes it’s clear in both directions, and I can glide all the way across to the far outside lane which is my objective. Other times I have to wait for something to open up just to get to the crossover space in the middle, then to the inside lane, and finally to the outside. Everybody knows this, right? You may have to share the crossover space with another vehicle and intuitively run the play together. These are suburban life-skills.

Today, traffic to the left was clear enough for me to make it to the middle crossover. I checked the right and determined that I could roll slowly to the middle, then ease behind the woman in the silver minivan as she passed without having to stop. That’s what I was thinking, but evidently she thought I was going to ram her. She abruptly stops. And now, I have to stop. She gives me a searing “How stupid can you be?” look and punctuates it by mouthing “What the ****?!” I instinctively reacted with a confused “What?” and raised my hands in a “What did I do?” gesture.

That was the tipping point for her.

She slammed the back of her left hand against the driver-side window with a long, skinny, middle finger standing furiously at attention. A sharpened fingernail added an extra angry inch to the salute. All that was for me. She turned into the parking lot to drop off her kids, and I continued down the road trying to process what just happened. I thought about turning around, maybe engaging her in conversation, but I quickly came to my senses.

As the dust settled, I thought about this lady’s kids who were in the car with her and whether this was something they had become accustomed to. I wondered, as they grow older, when life gets stressed and circumstances are out of their control, would this mom’s behavior become their behavior?

I looked at my reflection in the rearview mirror and thought about times when I have reacted to situations in ways that didn’t represent well for my daughter who has been in the car with me. Granted, she has never seen my anger make its way to my middle finger, but there are other times I have self-righteously displayed a much less than the best example. Over time the buildup of these little cynical, sarcastic, arrogant, judgmental and condemning critiques are just as damaging as the occasional middle finger explosions.

There are so many teachable moments in life. Good, bad, or ugly, school is always in session. When I shared this story with my wife, she reminded me that you never ever mess with a mom in a minivan in car line. Lesson learned!

I got the finger in car line today. How’s your day going?

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer. (Psalm 19:14)