Assuming the pilot of the plane is probably a better pilot than I am a driver and most certainly a better pilot than the other motorists are drivers (because I'm haughty like that) plays into my sensation that flying's safer--which is different from my fear of causing injury or harm.

Uh-huh.

I like flying. I think I do it just enough to enjoy the novelty and not enough to be irritated by the crap behind it. (1-3 times a year.) I also find comfort in knowing that plane crashes are relatively rare, so I don't mind a little turbulence.

However, even though I have my driver's license, I would freak if I had to get behind the wheel of a car. I have always blamed my fear of driving on getting my license when I was in my late 20's and more aware of cars are potential killing machines. Maybe if I had got my license when I was 16, I wouldn't be so freaked by driving a car.

Every so often I get struck with the " squishy filling in a really thin metal creampuff hurtling around at 75 mph" about driving, but it isn't fear, just....who thought this was a good idea? It's really quite ridiculous. Think about how many decisions you constantly have to be making, actions you are coordinating as the squishy filling in your flimsy creampuff?!!!

Flying doesn't really really ping me either, though I do get a little tense at landings. Turbulence in flight just relieves the boredom.

Somerville unhelpfully declared a snow emergency this morning (rather than last night), set to begin at 10am today, 2 hours before the snow was supposed to start. If they think this is the snowpocalypse, what are they going to do for Saturday's blizzard??

Seriously. Did everyone living here move from somewhere south of Maryland in the last year? Or suffer from a mass memory wipe? I'm a bit disappointed in my fellow supposedly hearty New Englanders.

The weekend blizzard will make things mighty interesting for the Pats game on Sunday, though.

Being in a car is much more likely to make me nervous than being in a plane, because I do it so little, and the things that could go wrong are RIGHT THERE! I always feel like someone's about to drive into us, or we're about to drive into something. Note: I am never the driver.

I just realized, I've been driving more than half my life.

I've been driving more than half my life.

And you're still not there yet?

Well, it's not like I have a paralyzing fear of flying. The prayer thing really helps, though. It's not so much about faith, though I do believe in God, because I don't believe God owes me a gentle death at no younger than 80 (though I sure hope that's what I get!). It's more ritual acknowledgment that I'm putting myself in God's hands for the duration. And then, aside from being a little tense on take-off and landing and gripping my seat arms with white knuckles during really bad turbulence, I'm not scared. I read my book and/or amuse Annabel.

And while I'd hate to be responsible for an accident, I think the main reason I'm more confident in a car than a plane is I drive every day and fly maybe four times a year. Sure, something bad could happen when I'm driving, but I've done all I can by driving carefully and seeing that my car is properly maintained. I have to drive, so there's no point worrying about the things that could go wrong. Maybe if I traveled a lot for work, I'd feel the same about flying, but I don't, so for me it's a somewhat exceptional circumstance, so I haven't come to terms with the things I can't control in the same way I have with driving.

" squishy filling in a really thin metal creampuff hurtling around at 75 mph"

Whereas I'm "hundreds of pounds of steel! terrible momentum!"

Doesn't help that I like to drive really fast, I suppose.

Driving bores me, because I can't read or do stuff during it, and I fear the idea of being responsible and alive in an accident, but I don't have any in-process anxiety except when people start acting up, or I'm driving canyon roads.

Fuck, I hate canyon roads. Which is a damned shame given where I live, but now my commute's trivial and can't involve them. Before they were an option.

Now, if someone else is doing the canyon driving? I love it! They're so pretty, especially as you're heading to the Pacific Coast Highway. I just really don't want to be the one in control there. I'm pretty zen about being killed by my friends.

I am actually flying this Xmas for the first time since all the liquids restrictions were put in place, and I'm reading the list of things that one can/can't bring along and it is b-a-n-a-n-a-s.