I am a good driver, really, I am. In 37 years of driving I have never hit anything, caused an accident and have managed to avoid other people who tried their best to run into me. I got one speeding ticket in 1974, and I keep my insurance and registration up. But today I did something really stupid and I am extremely pissed off at myself for it.
Today, on the way home, I stop at a red light at an intersection where I am about to go across two lanes of traffic, go under an overpass, then make a left hand turn and go down the frontage road. At the light, I am in the middle lane. The left lane has to turn left after the overpass, as does my lane, and the right lane continues straight across. I have gone through this intersection many times, but not from this perspective, but it is basically like every other underpass/overpass intersection like this anywhere in town, and probably across the USA.
The light turns green and I go through the crossing traffic lanes, then under the overpass. I am looking ahead to see the dotted white lines showing me where I need to take my left hand turn after I exit from underneath the overpass.
In every circumstance I can recall, by the time I get to the intersection after the overpass, the lights then turn green for all three lanes to go through. As I enter the intersection, I slow for my turn, but something tells me that things aren’t right. The traffic coming towards me, in the lanes I will be crossing during my left turn, is still coming through the intersection. Almost at a stop in the center of the intersection, I look up at my light. It is still red. For about a second I am stunned to see the red light, then I realize I am in the middle of the intersection, so I abort my turn and go on across.
At first I am thankful that no one hit me before I realize that there was no traffic coming through the intersection that would have broadsided me. The only cars allowed through at that time were the couple that I would have had to cross in front of if I had made the turn. Still, I realize I was lucky that I didn’t have an accident or cause one. I’m sure several people saw me, and thought me a total idiot (which I was), but no one had to even lift off their gas pedal because of my foolish stunt.
I have been mad at myself ever since. I always check the lights because they can always be reset or modified due to construction, but today I ASSUMED that the light would change on cue for me, and it didn’t. Under slightly different circumstances, the consequences could have been very bad.
Today I was the dumbass on the road that I always rant about.
Sorry about that. Wakeup call noted. Won’t happen again.