April 2, 2007.  I have begun several articles on the subject of "denial," but I've been unable to pull my ideas together satisfactorily.  My premise is that many of the problems besetting us as individuals and as a society are the result of trying to ignore the problem – in other words, of denying that the problem exists.  Furthermore, I believe that denial exacerbates existing problems.

One example that immediately comes to my mind is my pet peeve – the catastrophic failure of our system of public education.  I firmly believe that one of the main reasons we have not successfully addressed the situation is that people in general deny that we have a problem or, at the very least, insist that it is not as serious as old grumps such as me make it out to be.  I base this conviction on numerous conversations with people who meet my hand-wringing about education with convenient rationalizations that contradict well-documented evidence.

I learned in psychology class that denial is a defense mechanism, with rationalization its primary tool.  We use it to protect ourselves from realities that are too painful or too inconvenient to accept.  When reality hurts, we play mental tricks on ourselves to make reality "go away."  When we don't want to take action (it's too much work, it is inconvenient, we would rather be doing something else, etc.), we somehow rationalize that action is not necessary or can be postponed.  Denial can be useful within certain limits, but it is hazardous when it causes us to ignore urgent situations – problems that will become worse if we continue pretend that they don't exist.

I surmise that denial is, at least in part, a result of the comfortable lifestyles to which many of us have become accustomed.  We don't necessarily feel that everything is perfect, but it's "good enough."  Why should we change anything or listen to pessimists and cynics who point out that we have problems?

Even the language reflects this attitude.  It's customary these days to refer to any problem as an "issue."  An "issue" is a problem about which we intend to nothing.  Global warming, the increasing federal deficit, the war in Iraq, illegal immigration, corruption in politics, world hunger, and so on are all "issues," not problems that we need to address with any sense of urgency.  Sure, we may discuss such matters, but cocktail-party chatter about an "issue" does not amount to an acknowledgement that it is something about which we need to do something.  Those who are doing something are "activists"; in many people's lexicon, activist denotes an extremist nutcase who is threatening our complacent cocoons of denial.

With regard to all of the "issues" I've mentioned, the longer we try to ignore them, the worse they get.  Eventually, when we cannot ignore them anymore, when we are hit on the head by the two-by-four of reality, we ask "How could that have happened?"  It happened, dummy, because you weren't paying attention, because you were too busy wallowing in the comfortable featherbed of denial.

In my view, many of the crises we are (finally) confronting right now have been exacerbated by our indulgence in long periods of rationalization and denial.  Just how long, for example, did we claim that the Iraq debacle was "moving forward" when, in fact, it was descending into chaos?  Some individuals are still clinging to denial in that and other matters.  Global warming?  It doesn't exist.  Problems with the schools?  Only a few schools are failing; ours is fine.  The federal deficit?  Highly overstated.  Corruption in politics?  It's to be expected; politicians have always been somewhat corrupt.  World hunger?  Not my problem; I have plenty to eat.

It's uncomfortable and often painful to confront problems.  It's tempting to hope that, if we ignore them, they will go away all by themselves.  They won't.  If the curtains are on fire, do you think that, if you close your eyes, the fire will go away?  Do you rationalize, "Oh, well, I never liked those curtains anyway"?  Do you let the house burn down and blame "fate"?  We would all agree that such thinking would be insane, yet we somehow cannot grasp that denial of other, often more consequential realities is a form of madness.

April 8, 2007.  It's Easter.  It's spring, too – I think.  We can't tell it from the weather, since we haven't seen 60 degrees in a week and are not likely to do so in the next week.  I'm told there have been snow flurries.  This should feed the arguments of skeptics about global warming, even though a few days of cooler weather indicate nothing about climate in general.

April 13, 2007.  Sometimes I hear about things that happen to other people that make me as angry as if they happened to me.  Such was the case with an experience one of my students had.

Driving back to New Jersey from Philadelphia, she was pulled over by a Pennsylvania state trooper for going 65 in a 55 mph zone on the interstate (at this point, the interstate has only two lanes in each direction).  That was fair enough – though it is also true that anyone who drives at the speed limit on an interstate just about anywhere will be passed by nearly everyone else (including every eight-wheeler).  She did get off with a warning, and the trooper left before she even got back on the highway.

Now comes the nasty part.  She got back on the highway and, heeding the warning, was driving at 55 mph.  Five minutes after pulling back on, she saw, in her rearview mirror, a truck barreling down on her – fast.  She could not safely pull off to the shoulder, and by the time she had signaled a lane change to the left, the truck had hit her.  Luckily, she survived, but she had major neck injuries, and her car was totaled.  Her two passengers were also hurt.

As it turned out, the investigating officer at the accident was the same trooper who had told her to slow down.  Since he had left before she pulled back on the highway, he had had to make a U-turn to return to the scene of the accident – an accident that he probably realized would not have happened if he hadn't stopped her or if she had continued driving at 65 mph (still probably less than the truck driver was going).  To add to this, he issued her a ticket for not signaling when she pulled back on the highway – which he could not know since he had already left and which was totally irrelevant because the accident must have occurred four or five miles beyond where she had been pulled over.

Officials in Pennsylvania are insisting that she must pay the fine.  Her insurance company has said that she should not; the damage to the car indicates that she was hit not from the side as she was pulling onto the highway but dead on the rear.  There are enough holes in the trooper's story to drive a truck through.

She is suing.  I hope she gets a bundle – pain and suffering, the works.  Her medical bills are going to be considerable, she has been enduring a lot of pain, and her work at school and in her two jobs has been jeopardized.

I've always thought that the speed limits on interstates become meaningless when they are rarely enforced.  Now I am beginning to believe that this random enforcement of speed limits makes those highways more dangerous for the few who obey the law than they are for the majority of drivers (and especially truck drivers) who ignore the limits.

April 24, 2007.  We just spent a four-day weekend on Cape Cod, visiting my wife's sister and brother-in-law.  Getting to and from the Cape involves a seven- to nine-hour drive, mostly on interstate highways.  The longest interstate highway stretch on our route was I-95 across the southern part of Connecticut – a heavily traveled highway that runs literally through many cities.  The posted speed limit for most of the way is 65 mph, though it may be posted at 55 mph in more congested areas and even 45 mph in construction zones, of which there are many.  Hardly anyone drives at less than 70.

The practice of driving at least 10 mph above the posted limit is not confined to that stretch of highway.  It exists wherever limits are either uneforced or so rarely enforced that the odds of getting a speeding ticket are only slightly higher than those of winning the lottery – that is, several thousands to one.  That means just about everywhere.  As a result, a speed limit of 65 translates to 75 or 80 in the minds of most interstate travelers.  Given that, when traffic is even moderately heavy, most vehicles are less than four car lengths behind the one in front of them, one doesn't need a degree in physics to know that this is not a safe speed.

Now, I also drive short stretches on the interstates near my home (speed limits either 55 or 65), and I rarely exceed 65 mph.  However, that is only because the jumps are too short for me to feel the compulsion to reach and maintain "cruising speed."  I am not a slow driver (the type I call "diddle-farts").  Slow drivers are, I believe, indirectly responsible for many accidents, even if they aren't in them themselves, partly because they cause other drivers to maneuver around them.  On our recent trip, I followed my usual practice of trying to stay within the flow of the traffic – not zipping in and out of lanes like a maniac but not dawdling along like a diddle-fart either.  As a result, I found my speedometer hovering in the 75 mph range, eben in 55 mph zones (the flow speed in the construction zones, posted at 45, was about 60).  Sometimes, though I was still well within the flow and some drivers were still passing me, the speedometer hit 80.  This is not a speed at which I feel comfortable.

I swear we are all insane.  The minutes gained by driving 10 or even 20 mph above the limit are, in the long run, insignificant – even on a 300-mile trip such as ours from New Jersey to Cape Cod.  A little extra dawdling or standing in line at a rest stop can easily eat up what little time we gained.  Nobody does the math.  We're all intent upon driving as fast as or faster than the other guy.  What is it about getting behind the wheel of an automobile that makes even normally sensible people nuts?