The Unkindest Cuts of All? Those Who Just Won’t Yield

Excuse me, but may I cut in?

I’ve had my turn signal on for what seems like days now, the nose of my little van angled assertively toward the next lane.

Somewhere up ahead--I know it’s there, I caught a glimpse of it twice--is a portable electronic sign with flashing arrows signaling that a lane is closed. We must merge right, but we’re not moving.

If human aggressions and emotions were not involved, merging could be a smooth, uneventful process, with cars falling in together like the teeth on a zipper, barely even slowing down.

But drivers lucky enough to have found themselves in the correct lane are taking advantage of good fortune, leaving the rest of us to plead, bully or finesse our way in. It has to be accomplished without words, because we’re sealed in our individual metal-and-glass boxes.

Even in body language, we are considerably hampered because we’re strapped in and only partly visible. We also use the car as a vehicle for communication, blinking lights, beeping horns or simply aiming the thing to indicate where we’d like to go.

Merging tends to be easier at higher speeds, because at least traffic is moving. You just clench your teeth and hit the gas pedal when you see an open spot, praying and feeling confident that if you do get hit, at least you’re wearing clean underwear.

Then there are the timid types, the most maddening drivers of all. They drive tentatively up the on-ramp, signal blinking since last Tuesday. They hurry to get in ahead of you, then decide in a panic that they don’t have time or room, so they hit the brakes.

I began my current attempt to merge in the traditional manner: I flicked on my turn signal. The drivers in the other lane responded in the traditional manner as well, ignoring me.

Then I gave the steering wheel a few twists and pointed myself toward them, nudging forward to make it clear that I was willing to risk my right front fender for a chance to get home before dark. (This method works best, by the way, if the fender in question happens to be scarred and mangled already; that way they know you’re not bluffing.)

Now I’m trying earnestly to establish eye contact with the man in the black Porsche to my right. If I can get him to look me in the eye, he’ll have to acknowledge that there’s a fellow human being in here, and if he does that, chances are he’ll let me in.

He knows it too. That’s why he’s keeping his eyes intently fixed on the car in front of him. He slips steadily forward, past me and the dozen or so other cars trying to merge into his lane.

Oops--maybe it’ll work better if I take off my sunglasses. Sure enough, the woman in the next car senses my gaze and looks up at me. I plead with her silently, and she backs off, smiling (“But of course! After you!”).

As I slide over, I remember my manners too. “Thank you,” I say in an exaggerated mime, tossing her a friendly wave. She smiles again. Drivers I’ve talked to agree that if you don’t get a wave, a nod, or some other small gesture when you let someone have cuts, that sweet, warm feeling of doing something nice for someone can instantly curdle, leaving you instead with the sour sense that you’ve been had.

Once I’m ensconced in the correct lane and I’ve offered a proper acknowledgement, I do what I always do. Rather than abandon my compatriots from the slow lane, I bring some of them with me. The poor woman who gave me cuts didn’t realize that I have a policy of letting at least two cars in ahead of me whenever I’m in one of these jam-ups, even though the usual quota, even for generous types, is one.

I’m such a sucker when it comes to mergers. I’ve been known to smile and let concrete trucks slip in ahead of me, as well as buses, delivery vans, even tractor-trailer rigs.

Once I’ve done it, of course, I start trying to get around them so I can see the road ahead, but at least I can feel as if I’ve done my good deed. And I don’t think I get home more than 30 seconds later because of it.

Most other drivers, however, are more discriminating about whom they will allow in.

One friend has a system for deciding the whole thing that harks back to her days as a Berkeley radical. If the car seems to be somewhat shopworn--a little primer on the fender, some missing chrome, a decent, hard-working car that has fallen upon hard times--she’ll give it a break. But if it’s a black Mercedes-Benz with gold trim, she probably won’t, figuring that the driver has already had more than his share of breaks in life.

Other drivers I know (mostly men) are less generous toward fast sports cars. For them, refusing to merge is a chance to win, somehow. They can look in the rear-view mirror, turn up their noses and say, “Fool! You spent $40,000 on a car that’ll do 160 and you can’t even get past my Toyota!”

But there is one kind of driver I don’t want to let in. That’s the guy who knows full well that he’ll have to get in the next lane like everybody else, but he zips up as far as he can as fast as he can, and then tries to cut in front of the 20 cars he just passed.

As far as I’m concerned, that guy can sit there blinking until he runs out of gas.