Reasons to Be Cheerful

Risk, risk aversion, risk tolerance – are entirely subjective matters.  The person who won’t ride on a big commercial jet, despite the impressive safety record, might cheerfully wade into a classroom full of five-year olds.  The person who won’t hold a baby might climb a 4,000-meter, icy, snowy mountain with little thought of danger.  Someone who skies and bikes and snowboards down every boulder-, rock- and tree-strewn hill or mountain he or she can find might refuse to swim, snorkel or scuba dive.[*]

I think my tolerance for risk is about moderate for my age and background.  I’ve done modified rock climbing at the advanced-beginner level in Italy’s Dolomites; I’ve scuba-dived with two instructors in a Virginia quarry in a hailstorm; I’ve trusted two men with lousy track records (and fairly lousy results); I’ve baby-sat infants, toddlers and adolescents for long weekends; I’ve walked three miles from the Channel to the Fenway at two in the morning, alone.  However – I always lock the doors at the house even though it’s a safe neighborhood, even though I’m home.  I won’t drink milk that smells even a little bit off.  I wear my seat belt.  I almost always wear a helmet when bicycling or horseback riding.  If a small effort can make me safer, I make that effort.

When A.T. tells me I’m brave to be driving around the U.S. alone, I think of all the steps I took to improve my odds of making it through without unfortunate incident:

•  I had Ralph check the car thoroughly before I left, and changed the oil again in California even though oil-life was at 40%;
• Even though it meant missing a most marvelous tea party in Dallas in September, I chose to make the northern circuit before heading south, so as to minimize the risk of snow in the Montana mountains;
• I waited until tornado season was over;
• I didn’t even consider detouring through Mexico, where all the kidnappings happen;
• School’s in session, significantly lowering the odds that some ill-regulated little monster will break my spine by jumping into a cheap-motel swimming pool without checking for lap-swimmers first;
• Ditto low odds of my being arrested for misdemeanor assault because of what I say or do to parents of ill-regulated little monsters who almost break my spine;
• I’ve stuffed the car too full of coats and apples and CDs and electronic devices even to be tempted to pick up any of the four or five hitchhikers I’ve seen in over 6,000 miles – they just wouldn’t fit;
• I’ve stayed with a few total strangers, but met them all first via The Uncrushable Jersey Dress, and the risk that someone would develop an extensive knowledge of the 135 goofy romances of Betty Neels, and fake an abiding interest therein, just to lure a middle-class, middle-aged woman with a Honda Civic into his or her home seems slight indeed;
• I have driven around sunset more often than I’d like, given the greater risk of animal-car encounters at dusk, but I’ve kept extra-alert at those times and so far my only casualties are three or four windshields’ worth of bugs;
• I’ve rarely let the gas gauge drop below three bars, though I came pretty close to fumes yesterday when a large and sprawling series of Kansas City shopping malls refused to yield a single gas station until I was just a skosh more nervous than I like to be.

So what precautions do you take?  Which do you advise?

---

[*] All examples based on friends and family.