Page 18 THE VILLADOM TIMES I • January 29, 2014 Civilization versus civility American civilization may not be the first civilization to fall because of undue civility, but because we all have to live here, we should postpone the day of the collapse by every means possible. A few weeks ago, I was at the library working on some computer problems that required expert advice. A few seats away, a young woman was sneezing and sneezing, excus- ing herself, and then sneezing again. Within the next three days, two or three people came down with what seemed like the same malady. We have been sneezing and wheez- ing ever since. I generally do not approach women who do not know who I am because somebody who did not like me once told me that having me approach, according to some women, was rather like being attacked by Frankenstein’s monster. Sometimes, when people walk around an aisle shelf and see me standing innocently in front of them, they flinch and scream. This hurts my feelings. Big people have feel- ings, too. I am far too civil to walk up to a woman to whom I have not been introduced and say something boorish like, “Hey, lady, why don’t you take your cold home instead of giving it to everybody else in a public space?” So I remained a nominal gentleman and got sick, as did a couple of other people. Our chivalry cost society about 10 work days, but made up for it in economic terms in the cost of facial tissue and orange juice. Resentment lingered. One guy who rides the bus told me that when he still drove a car, he went 27 years without a cold, and now that he rides the bus he gets colds all the time. I think that 27 years without a cold sounds a bit hyperbolic, but I understand the principle. If people refrain from sneez- ing in your face, you generally do not catch a cold. Colds are caused by germs. They do not come from wet clothes or even wet heads when no germs are around. If people do not understand this, they need to be told. People in the contagious stages of infectious diseases should avoid any public place that is not a physician’s waiting room. Second case in point: driving in snow. I have taken a couple of hard hits driving in snow and prefer not to do it. Many years and several cars ago, a guy came out of a park- ing lot on Franklin Turnpike and hit me broadside, pushing my car off the road and smashing two doors. I was into what you might call “politics” back then, and the fact that he knew my first name before he had seen my license and registration should have rung a bell. However, the odds are slim that he was some sort of operative as opposed to a bad driver who thought he could stop in snow by hitting the brakes. I would tend to go with the “bad driver” explana- tion. My paranoia is under control, probably because I am so boring that I have nothing to hide. It is not my fault that a lot of people made telephone calls predicting events that came true... The secret of driving safely in snow is not to drive at all. Most mature drivers know that you need to multiple car lengths to stop, and that you may not stop at all if you are headed downhill on a steep grade. Most mature drivers know that if you simply hit the brakes, the car is more likely to skid into the curb, a tree, or the opposite lane than it is to stop dead and let the person behind you hit your bumper because he or she failed to see it coming. The trouble is that most immature drivers do not know this. The danger is not the pretty snowflakes in the winter wonderland. The danger is the other drivers who do not understand that those pretty snowflakes, especially when they have ice under- neath, turn the road surface into a skating rink. My special candidates for the Dishonor Roll are people who honk when they want you to exceed the speed limit more than five miles per hour because they are in a hurry. Not too long ago, I was driving my wife from one job to another when some guy behind me just could not stay off the horn. He wanted me to turn up a narrow street that was occupied by moving cars turning right and turning left. Had I done so, there would have undoubtedly been a colli- sion and I would have been at fault. I tried to calmly ignore his honking while venting verbally at the top of my lungs for my wife’s amusement. Later that day, we saw a crossing guard who looked very much like the guy with the happy horn who wanted me to have an accident so he wouldn’t be late for his job. I hope it was simply a case of two people looking alike. Crossing guards are posted to prevent acci- dents, are they not? I must have been mistaken. I hope so. Another instance: The Invisible Man! A few years ago, I turned into an unlighted parking lot and lo and behold, walking away from me so I could not see his face, was a man with dark hair, a gray overcoat, and black pants and shoes. Had he been a Ninja, he could not have been better camouflaged against a stretch of gray asphalt and the dark- ness beyond. I am not a fast driver and had adequate time to stop. Had I been a fast driver, one of those people who thinks he or she can stop on a dime, that pedestrian would have been on his way to the hospital, or worse. The Invisible Man cropped up in a different guise on North Maple Avenue in Ridgewood. I was driving after dusk on a stretch that has no streetlights. Sure enough, I spotted a pedestrian facing away from traffic, wearing a dark coat and pants outside the crossing lines. I never push the limit, especially in residential or commercial areas, but if somebody with a heavy foot had been driving, that pedestrian could have been hit. What it comes down to is realizing there are other people in the world. The word “idiot,” from Greek, does not mean a person with a deficient IQ. In Greek and formal English, idiot means an emotionally dense person who takes no inter- est in any concerns but his or her own. People like this were a bane to Athens where “democracy” functioned because all citizens were expected to serve in the army when young and to join the Assembly or serve on juries when they were mature, and to contribute large sums of money to the state when they were rich. The Athenian democracy we esteem was somewhat hypocritical. Respectable women stayed home while men did the shopping, and the only women who had influence were the formally recognized concu- bines of statesmen. Slaves were bought and sold on a regular basis. While the household slaves were not treated too badly, being sent to the mines was a death sentence in slow motion -- and the mines were the principal basis of Athenian prosperity, though people seldom mention that. Not surprisingly, during the debate about slavery in America, the abolitionists cited the Bible in opposing the enslavement of Africans -- “man stealing” carried the death penalty in scripture-- while Southern slave owners cited the Greek and Roman classics, where slavery was the basis of society, be it ever so decadent. Modern workaday Americans are undoubtedly impacted by people who bring their germs to public places and driv- ers who do not understand that snow and ice can be danger- ous. Pedestrians need to look out for cars just as motorists need to look out for pedestrians, which is not easy when the pedestrians do not use marked crossings and wear dark clothing against an asphalt background at night. I am not a fan of Charles Darwin. People do not deserve to die because they are silly. However, sensible people need their help to avoid killing them -- and ourselves. Wyckoff Route 66’s mystique continues Jay Leno prepares to interview authors Sal Santoro (center) and Wyckoff’s Bob Walton (right). Their book, ‘Route 66: The People, The Places, The Dream’ is a Jay Leno’s Book Club selection.