I Liked That Lane Better Anyway

Southern Maryland got a couple of inches of snow on Sunday, just enough to throw off your groove while driving.

I had gone to my uncle's house to watch the NFC and AFC championship games and eat steamed oysters. Steamed oysters are one of those foods where I'll eat about two a year and that's all I need; it's just not compelling, as food goes. Eat one with a saltine cracker and all the flavor disappears.

Anyhow, by the time I started the drive home, full of meatballs and chicken wings (and two oysters), it was quite dark outside and the snow was still falling in tiny, heavy flakes. The roads were dusted but the snow was struggling to stay anything more than melted. For a moment, I forget I'm driving in snow and I slide out a bit while braking before the road I'm trying to turn onto.

Okay, no big deal, I drive a WRX, it's got all-wheel drive and performance tires, so I only need to be super careful when trying to come to a stop. I get onto that road and make my way down to a T intersection with a light. I want to make a left turn, and there's two turning lanes available. The leftmost lane has two cars, and the right lane is empty. I move into the leftmost lane and apply the brakes.

I feel a crunching sensation beneath my right foot as the brake shoes struggle to find purchase on the snow-caked brake pads. They can't. I'm already driving pretty slowly, so I'm forced to watch myself slide helplessly at 15 miles per hour towards the rear of the car in my turning lane. I figure I'm going to hit, and bumper damage will result, but little more. I'm dreading more the thought of having to exit my vehicle into the butt cold to exchange insurance information.

Then, inspiration strikes.

I turn the wheel slightly right, as though I were changing lanes. My all-wheel drive does not fail me and the car dutifully pulls into the empty turning lane, still unable to stop but at least now I'm not going to trade paint with the person in front of me.

Physics eventually does its thing and, incredibly, my car comes to a stop right where it should, abreast the first car to my left, lined up to turn. Nobody was the wiser; I bet if I'd had a passenger even they wouldn't have thought the lane change was anything but casual.

Just because you're trying to avoid an accident doesn't mean you can't be smooth while doing it.