Soft Verges
Recently, whilst in the passenger seat of my partner’s car, on the motorway driving I do not recall where, I saw a road sign reading ‘Soft Verges’. Already feeling emotionally porous - I always feel more, being transported - the wording moved me.
I was not previously acquainted with ‘Soft Verges’ signs, less so with their official meaning. I do not drive. At seventeen, I righteously refused to learn as my friends spent their weekends gearing up for new-found freedoms. I declined to acquire the skill of driving - as I saw it then - for ethical reasons. I was very worried about climate change.
For as long as I’ve been somewhat aware of the warming planet, our perilous ecological trajectory has disturbed me - as it should, I suppose; as it does many of us. As a teenager, with only a seedling understanding of capitalism but an overzealous sense of self, I really believed my refusal to get behind the wheel would ‘make a difference’. My aversion was quite specific: I couldn’t imagine my foot pressing down on an accelerator because then, I reasoned, I would be to blame.
As I came to understand the systemic heft of capitalism, I realised my demurral of driving was mostly pointless. But before I had time to consider whether this shift in perspective entailed a shift in desire, the option disappeared. Whilst at university, I started having tonic-clonic seizures and was diagnosed with epilepsy, so driving was off-limits.
All this to say, I suppose: being alive can be worrying and fitful and dangerous, and I am grateful that words alone can move us along, sometimes more safely. Thank you to whoever invented ‘Soft Verges’ signs, for your beautiful turn of phrase.
I hope that ‘Soft Verges’ means glad ambivalence; I hope that it means gentle refusals and firm compassion. I hope that it means if we slip off the edge, we’ll be okay, and find our way back to the road.
