Honkers.

Let’s discuss honkers, honking and Midlife.

Because I love it when people honk at me in the Dunkin drive-thru line when I’m also in the Dunkin drive-thru line.

First, a few disclaimers.

If you drive (or ride) in places like New York City, you know that honking and choice vocabulary words are basically a normal extension of traffic signs. In fact, my VERY FIRST international memory features a guy in a suit getting scraped off the pavement in London after head-butting a taxi, so I fully support honking as in the spirit of safety. I suspect those of you who have spent time in major population centers around the globe would agree with me.

Second, only people who are ordering COFFEE or the best DONUTS in the world should go to Dunkin. If you don’t agree with me that Dunkin is primarily a destination for coffee and donuts, you need to get right with the Lord.

Lastly, if a person drives-thru Dunkin, you know they are in the ‘burbs and not in an urban area with the prerequisite honking. People in urban areas WALK to get their coffee because there is too much traffic and no place to park.

Based on all of the above, if a person has the actual TEMERITY to honk at people like me who are trapped in front of them in the Dunkin drive-thru line AND THEN they order a HAM & CHEESE ROLL-UP but NO COFFEE, we all deserve an opportunity to publicly examine said person’s poor life choices.

And to that poor, lost, honking soul who was close enough that I could hear you place your order for a HAM & CHEESE ROLL-UP but NO COFFEE - and to anyone who may be a non-urban honker at people trapped in drive-thru lines across America - I would like to offer you this perspective.

It matters not.

Your honking matters not at all to Midlifers like me.

For example, when you honk at me, you are honking at a mother who has a child taking real steps to fly actual combat helicopters while, at the same time, you are honking at a daughter who serves as on-call tech support for her senior parents.

Obviously, I need ALL THE COFFEE, and your little beep-beep-I-need-a-ham-and-cheese-roll-up matters not.

When you honk at me, you are honking at a traveler who, in her younger years, once had rocks thrown at her in an occupied territory and later, in another country, had to leave a village due to an actual attempt to practice witchcraft on her person.

Your under-caffeinated honking is honestly pretty tame in the grand scheme of things, and it matters not.

And finally, when you honk at me, you are honking at the wife of a long-time (former) pastor and a neophyte who taught the Senior Ladies’ Sunday School class exactly once in her life. I can ASSURE you with one thousand percent confidence that, having survived Ms. Betty’s cross-examination on Queen Esther, your honking is low-brow, poorly informed and, quite frankly, underwhelming.

Furthermore, I feel justified in sharing that your honking is a disappointment, and also that the Senior Ladies of the Senior Ladies’ Sunday School class would effectively handle you, starting with your ungodly aversion to coffee and most likely ending with some pound cake.

I do not know what compels an otherwise lovely human with an inexplicable desire for a ham and cheese roll-up to honk at her neighbors who are very clearly stuck in the same Dunkin line in which she finds herself.

But I do know that everywhere you look, there are honkers trying to tell Midlifers where to go and what to do and how fast to get there, all on high volume. 

And it matters not.

What does matter is that we Midlifers keep holding our own, filtering the things we take in across the totality of our experiences and filtering out the things that just don’t matter at all.

Except coffee. Coffee matters very much to Midlifers.