1128

I get a lot of e-mail from readers, and the number one thing people ask me is, “Adam,” they ask, “Why don’t you write more about your experiences in traffic?” Well, I never thought people would be all that interested in reading about my commute, since normally things go pretty smoothly for me, but today was an exception, and so I shall write.

A sea of stopped cars greeted me as I came over the bridge that drops me onto I-85 south this morning. A fatality near GA-400 had 85 backed up all the way to 285. I sighed and accepted that I wouldn’t be at work as early as I’d hoped to be.

As my lane began to merge with the one to my right, I let a car ahead move over into my lane, and noticed that a black Lexus sedan with tinted windows and gold trim was intent on moving into my lane right, too. I’ve hardened as a driver over the past four years of commuting and generally attempt to keep things fair. I like to see lanes merge like a zipper. I’ll take steps to ensure that happens, too, including staying nice and close to the car that just merged in front of me, offering the black Lexus with gold trim a place behind me.

I find that if you’re firm with your position, and your car isn’t as nice as theirs, you can usually force them to back off. They’re probably not going to ram you while merging. This driver was having none of my zipper action, though. For a hundred yards we inched along, he trying to horn in while I kept my position. Then he rolled down his tinted window.

One generally tries not to establish eye-to-eye contact with another driver when executing this maneuver, but when the other driver is yelling at you in a squeaky yet forceful voice, it’s hard not to look. One wants to be sure that no firearms have been drawn just yet. Think Anthony Anderson, but mean-looking: a 25-30 year old 350-400lb black man in a blue t-shirt, holding his open flip phone in his right hand while yelling at you in a squeaky voice. I do not care to guess his profession.

I also folded. I can be a stubborn ass when driving and attempting to maintain my version of order, but only to a point. In retrospect the worst he could have done would be to shoot me, if he even had a gun, or perhaps throw his cell phone at my window. Our cars were close enough that him exiting the vehicle was fairly unlikely.

As he pulled in front of me and adopted the familiar center console lean, continuing to chat (or yell?) on his cell phone, I contemplated what his conversation might include. Perhaps he was used to shouting down drivers who didn’t bow down to Lexi and he had gone on discussing the new iPod Nano, or perhaps he had a thing or two to say about jerks who drive Jeeps. Perhaps most likely, he had been on hold with Apple technical support for an hour and was getting a little fed up. I know what that’s like. I could forgive that.

Posted: Monday, September 12th, 2005 at 10:45 am; Category: 1128; Comments feed: RSS 2.0.
You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.