The Duel

Driving in Portsmouth, New Hampshire presents a distinct set of challenges, even on a good day in a compact car.   The city's narrow, one way streets and overabundance of uppity, traffic-oblivious gentry require you to be on constant look out for pedestrians and you need to know the route you are taking like the back of your hand.    You also have to be on the lookout for those drivers that have become so hopelessly lost in the maze of one-way streets and back alleys that they have stopped even giving an iota of a crap about common sense and traffic laws, and will do anything to get back to the turnpike.  Wednesday afternoon, I encountered one such person.

Portsmouth had been battered pretty heavily by Tuesday's blizzard, though their cleanup efforts had been mores successful than those of my beloved Portland's.    The main roads were clear and salted, and they even had cleared off the commercial loading zone we use.   After visiting my destination, I made my way back to the van, thinking that wasn't so bad. 

I was about to turn left onto Porter Street, when a car came zipping by, going the wrong direction.   Porter is a one-way street, little more than a back alley, barely wide enough for the van.   Apparently, there is an obscure clause in New Hampshire's weird, Libertarian laws, nestled somewhere towards the end of the "living free" portion, right on the cusp of the "or dying" section that apparently negates the meaning of one way street signs on days following blizzards for the elderly and feeble of mind.  I say this because a minute later, as I was well past the point of being able to do anything besides move forward, I came face-to-face with a minivan, driven by an Orville Redenbacher looking chap, again headed the wrong way.

I stopped, and waited for the other driver to start backing up.    He didn't.  Instead, he looked sheepishly at me, clearly aware of the fact that he'd been caught doing something incredibly stupid, but unwilling to do anything to rectify the matter because New Hampshire.

No, I did not flash the Old Hoss at him.   Were I in my own vehicle, I would have, but I try to remain professional when on the road.  Instead, I gave him the universal pointy speak sign for "Sir, you are going the wrong way down a snowy, one way street and have a much larger vehicle coming towards you."  You know the one.  You stretch your arms out to your sides with your palms up like they are weighing something while swinging your head back and forth like a king cobra to signify "I am deeply exasperated with you.  What is your intention?!".

He continued staring at me, now with sad, puppy dog eyes.

I pointed to the one way street sign behind me, then pointed at him and motioned for him to move back.

Nothing.

More gesticulating followed.  I tried to indicate that I was on an incline, in the snow in a much larger vehicle and there was no possible way for me to safely back up, which can be translated as "slope-hand car backwards-slash-too big-narrow alley-you clod."

Nothing.

I repeated the gestures, this time more frantically.

Finally, the light bulb turned on.  He started rolling forward again, edging towards the entrance to the parking garage to my immediate left, until he couldn't get proceed any further.

I slammed my head down against the wheel, screamed some Spanish obscenities about his mother's occupation, then decided to cut my losses and push on through.   While I did not actually collide with his vehicle, I came within less than an inch of it and got stuck in a snow drift.

I backed out, and looked at him for a moment, hoping he got the picture, but he no longer felt like making eye contact.  After two more attempts, I managed to get up on the sidewalk and roll past without crushing him.

I didn't look back, but I think it's safe to assume that he drove down a man hole.