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WWLATE #2 No stop signs…
Written by Jimmy
We love you. We really do. And we especially love that you have no stop signs.
When we moved here in 1995 we starting driving within a month. Untrained.
Our first observation was you had no stop signs.
When we visited friends in the US, we’d talk about this. Our little speech went something like:
“England is such an old, ancient society. Where rules have been around for 1,000 years. Civil Society with long, deep roots. Take driving for instance. They don’t need stop signs. You just know. If you’re on a small road coming to a big road, of course, you stop. If you’re entering into an equal size road, you just work it out. Eye contact. In our youngish, newish, shiny little USA, we need other convention. We need stop signs. The English don’t. And we think this is amazing.”
For the first year, we didn’t feel the need to pass off our observations to our English friends. They knew all this. They’ve driven without stop signs for years.
But one evening with close friends the conversation turned to differences between our two countries. They told stories. We told stories. One of their stories was about our dear friend breaking down in tears at a Wal*Mart parking lot, certain she was going to be gunned down in a gang drive by while looking for her car. Oh, my. Our story was a lot more complementary. We gave our little speech about no stop signs.
There was silence around the table.
Then someone asked.
Do you know about the double lines on the road?
The what?, we asked.
We drove another couple to the party.
We drove home alone.
Jimmy