A few weeks ago, my car radio stopped working, taking with it the CD player, the tape player-everything, really, that distracts me while I drive.
For several days, I kept rediscovering this new feature of my old car. I’d get in, start the ignition, then try to turn on the already-on radio, only to recall that it was broken. Still.
So I’d drive off in silence. All around me drivers, pedestrians and even bicyclists were listening to news or music or talking on their phones. At some point I’d forget again that the radio wasn’t working and try to turn it on. It felt like a preview of Alzheimer’s. Or purgatory.
But after a few days of this nonsense, I made a remarkable discovery: I wasn’t actually driving in silence. There were lots of sounds around me that I otherwise wouldn’t have noticed. I discovered that the side streets in Oak Park were full of bird songs and that the whooshing of cars on the expressway almost sounded like water. I also discovered that my car had a loose belt.
Then I made an even more startling discovery: When I wasn’t distracted by talk or music, I starting paying more attention to everything around me. I read speed limit signs and billboards. I noticed the shimmery mirages above the roads on steamy hot days. I steered around potholes instead of bumping through them. I was more courteous to pedestrians and other drivers because I was paying more attention to where they were trying to go.
And I realized that I was actually enjoying this quiet time. I could think, observe and listen. I stopped reaching for the “on” switch and started to appreciate the lack of distractions.
This is actually the second time I’ve made this discovery. The first was several years ago when I used to wear a Walkman while jogging because I was afraid I’d get bored. I’d turn on All Things Considered and run to the rhythm of Robert Siegel’s voice. But when I got home, I realized I rarely remembered anything I had heard. I hadn’t really heard anything at all. It was background noise. So I stopped jogging with the Walkman and found that I never got bored. I used that time to focus on things that I wouldn’t otherwise have time to ponder. It turned out to be valuable thinking time.
I knew the same thing would be true while I was driving, but I never acted on this knowledge. My fear of being bored behind the wheel led me to reach for the radio whenever I was in the car. But this period of radio-free driving proved that I was fine without listening to talk or music. Perhaps I was even better off without it.
The car is not mine alone, however, and the weight of public opinion in my family was against me. So I took the car to the mechanic, who replaced a fuse. Two minutes and seven dollars later, I had my radio, CD player and tape player again. And yes, I quickly went back to my old ways.
But try it some time. See if you can go for a day or two without any distractions in your car. See if it changes the way you drive, or if you see and hear things you otherwise would have missed. It’s so easy these days to have a soundtrack playing at all times. Between iPods, portable music players, cell phones and radios, most people seem to be plugged in most of the time. It requires some effort to get away from the constant background noise. But if you can do it-even for a short time-you might be amazed by what you discover.
Sharon Bloyd-Peshkin is a professor in the journalism department at Columbia College Chicago.