Am I Unconsciously Looking for a Fight?

'You're gunna get a slap mate,' the burly man in cargo trousers said to me. He was on one of those Lime Bikes you mostly see discarded on the pavement. 'Do you want a slap?' He asked. 

Maybe I was looking for one, I thought. This was one of the altercations that came from nothing, but had all of a sudden metastasised into something quite nasty. Just ten seconds before, cargo man had resorted to mounting the pavement on his bike to skip around the London traffic. Cyclists on pavements is a huge bug bear of mine, and I shook my head at him to let him know as such. 

With this he brought his bike screeching to a halt, and asked in a very colourful fashion why I was shaking my head at him. 

'There's no cycle lane here. I have to cycle on the pavement to get by the traffic. Why are you shaking your head?' In this interest of keeping this article PG, I've subtracted all the expletives that would have otherwise been found between every other word. 

'Look,' I said already cursing my involuntary shaky disapproving head. 'Shaking one's head is not an offence, but cycling on the footways in England and Wales is.' 

A couple more back and forths ensued. Some more threats of slaps, not from myself I might add. And Cargo man cycled off informing me that I've been warned never to shake my head again at his complete and utter indifference to the Highway Code. 

But was I looking for a fight? Only the day before I had a run-in with someone at the post office over something even more innocuous. Am I on edge? Am I need of getting some deep rooted aggression out of my system? Perhaps the strains of the cost of living crisis, increase in wholesale prices, the war in Ukraine, the announcement that the soap opera Neighbours will return on a streaming to which I have not subscribed. A perfect soup of unrealised potential fused with the struggles of modern day living. Or is everyone else just being a nob-head right now? 

Perhaps it's all the above, but I am feeling like something has been brewing. My hands are a little idle right now and we all know what the devil what makes of those. Are you feeling it too? 

I've had a little thought experiment. Let's say I did get into slapsy-cuffs with Cargo man, and I whooped him. What would be the upside of that 'victory'? Maybe I could have caused some lasting damage. Perhaps it could have been filmed and gone viral on one those online viral machines and before you know it I'm before the magistrate, no doubt shaking my head again in disbelief. 

So after some deliberation, I've decided to no longer engage in disapproving gestures. I say it to myself before I leave the house each morning, 'don't shake your head, don't beep your horn, don't point out the starting positions of queues in post offices to non-post office employees. I always have an objective when I leave the house, and that's to return in exactly the same condition upon which I left. Preferably with all the possession I left with. 

This mantra served me well, yesterday and perhaps I've turned the corner. As I was pulling up to the services just off the M40, there was a queue two cars deep, with one car clearly stationary with no visible obstructions ahead. I was about to honk the horn, when I holstered my palm at the very last second. And thank I god I did. The person in the stationary car had either stalled, or had ran of petrol and the rest of passengers had filed out and were now pushing the car off road to allows to get through. I did think about lowering the window and asking they needed my help, but I was too hungover from my Sake Soiree the night before to indulge in any kind of philanthropy. 

What if I had honked my horn at that moment? Someone from the broken down car, wearing hideous cargo trousers no doubt, would have strutted over and pulled me out of my luxurious BMW1 series and slapped me silly, without even offering the courtesy of asking whether I was wanting one or not.

So lay off the horn people and don't allow your bug bears to get you into any wanted scrapes. PS - dear man in cargo trousers that accosted me on the pavement Fri 15th September Chiswick Lane. I'll f**kin' 'ave you next time.