Except to pass.

I don’t know how you and your friend(s) spend your bonding time, but sometimes Guy and I sit around thinking up funny domain names. (This is when we take a break from categorizing amusing phrases into band names, song titles, or album titles.) Every once in a while, the domains we come up with are so funny to us that we pay actual money to buy them. For example, a few years ago, Guy bought poop.fish as a birthday present for his friend Drew, and I own ipeedinthepool.com simply because it’s funny.

I already own sarahreebs.com (it’s had so many lives) but decided, as part of my 21 x 31 project, to get a new domain for a fresh start. This prompted a round of the domain name game. I considered brownhairedwhitegirl.com, youlooklikesomeoneiknow.com, a hundred variants of “haven’t we met before?” But, while I have described myself as generic-looking in the past, and get “recognized” regularly or told I look like *someone* on a regular basis, I don’t want to move forward with the idea that I am bland or forgettable.

I started thinking more seriously. What do I care about? What message do I want to send the world? How do I want to say it? What is funny but true? Who is this new person I am presenting online? The answer to all of these questions was either, everything, or, I don’t really know, and it is (un)surprisingly hard to come up with a good website name using that criteria. I did know I wanted something that made me laugh.

In the end, it was Guy, love of my life, who suggested this domain. It tickled me, even though it was a subtle jab at my impatience (for those readers who may not know me well, let’s just say that patience is not the first quality I exhibit.) Like a tic, “keep right except to pass,” escapes my lips every time I’m driving, or riding in a car, or talking about driving or riding in a car. I put it in the cart for giggles and let it marinate. I added and removed a few other contenders—many of the more positive messages I thought of were already taken, or weren’t memorable enough even to mention here.

I finally decided that Keep Right Except to Pass represents how I’m feeling right now: I need to hunker down, in the right-hand lane, and just do some things. Practice. Learn. Experiment. Then when I am more sure of my destination, I can speed past everyone, who will ideally be observing the rules of the road. It’s a good reminder that sometimes I need to step aside and let others go ahead of me. Most of all, I try to remind myself that it isn’t about beating the GPS estimated time (though, it is) but about enjoying the ride, savoring this journey, and ultimately the whole thing will be less stressful if I focus on me, and what I can bring to the road. (Do I sound like an inspirational blog yet?)

---

Okay, but straight talk (<rant>), PLEASE keep to the right unless you’re actively passing traffic on the left! You should never be “passing” empty lanes, and people should not be passing you on the right. All you do is make road conditions unsafe for everyone, because someone always wants to drive faster than you, even if you’re exceeding the speed limit:

---