I had good practice with my “getting upset at people” skills today.

This lady in her car almost sideswiped me on my bicycle on Oxford St as I was coming back from Harvard Square. I recall a minivan behind me who was being very friendly, waiting until there was room enough to pass me. I recall hearing her car behind the minivan, honking at the minivan because of their patience. The minivan passes at a friendly distance. Then she passes me with about 6 inches of room.

She pulled over further down to pick someone up. She was a big woman, mid-30s, in a grimy t-shirt and a black hoodie, smoking a cigarette. I went up to her and said “Excuse me, did you notice that you almost ran me over back there?” She was very bitchy, she said something about how bicyclists better get out of the middle of the road where cars are supposed to be.

I could tell she knew how close she had gotten to me, but she was convinced she owned the place. I could have told her about the law, but she seemed more than willing to flout it. I could have pointed out how narrow the street was, and how we all have to be extra careful, but she was not a woman of logic. I could have said “Look, regardless of what you believe just happened, will you please watch out for cyclists in the future?”, but she had no heart to take this to.

I said none of these things. I stood there, shocked that she was so rude, frozen. I said something like “I was over by the side of the road…” trailing off in a pleading way, hoping at least to tap into some tiny part of her emotions, and she was like “Yeah, whatever, you were way out in the middle, I don’t have time for this.” We went our separate ways.

She’s in a car, and I’m on a flimsy bicycle. In the eyes of the law we are equal travelers of the road, yet there will never be equality. But lets get to the meat of this encounter—I don’t want to rant on about bicycles vs. cars, because it might as well be Red Sox vs. Yankees, Kerry vs. Bush. And I’ll never see her again.

In confronting her, I specifically wanted to practice being upset with people. I’ve enrolled myself in a self-taught course where I try to get yelled at every once in a while and see how well I handle it. I’ve always known I’m not very good at it, unless being unresponsive and not thinking on my feet is somehow a desirable reaction. What I learned about and paid very close attention to today is this kind of physiological reaction I get when people are really rude with me. I lock up and then, at some point, this odd shiver sets in for a few minutes. You know, that nervousness that paralyzes the mind. Afterward, I go over the situation in my mind a few more times, thinking of what I could have said, etc. before I lay it to rest.

So — my question to you: how do I train myself to skip over the nervousness and get on with the show?