It’s early. Crazy early. I’m headed down the porch steps to my truck. The door opens. The cab light comes on. I settle into the seat and start her up. The clock on the dash says 4:52am.

In case you haven’t seen the world at this time of day in a while, it’s dark outside. Reminds me of those early mornings when Dad and I were moving quietly around the kitchen trying to warm up leftover biscuits to stuff in our pockets before heading out to the deer stand, or to drive down to Hawkinsville for a day of rabbit hunting.

Like my dad, I have, for most of my adult life, been an early riser. Retirement has reduced the sense of urgency I used to feel in getting my day started. These days, my clock goes off an hour later than it did when I was working. But I still enjoy my mornings more than any other time of day.

I think the last time I pulled out of my driveway before 5am was when I was delivering trees to a customer somewhere north of Atlanta. I’d bring the loaded trailer home with me from the farm the evening before. Park on top of the hill above the house. My goal was to leave early enough to make it through Atlanta before the interstate turned into the nightmare we call “the morning rush.”

Pine Mountain is still sleepy as I roll through town. The store fronts are dark. An employee at the Circle K is swapping out the bags in the outdoor trash cans. There’s a light on in the kitchen at the Whistling Pig, which means that Bob is already prepping for his day.

Ten miles north I turn down the ramp to I-185 and ease out into the traffic. And by traffic I mean me and three other vehicles.

There’s a peacefulness in the glow of the instrument panel. I hardly ever listen to the radio like I did when I was younger. I have come to prefer the solitude of my own mind when I’m on the road. It’s not that I have any great concerns to sort out. I’m not trying to solve the world’s problems. I don’t need the quiet. But the quiet allows me room to think should I have something to think about.

I’m merging onto I-85 now. The traffic doubles. Within a few miles it triples. And before long two lanes become three. The river of red tail lights in front of me winds toward the horizon. Not thick. Just steady. Sparsely spread out enough to be comfortable. Moving and changing enough to remind me of salmon swimming upstream.

And here’s what I think about. What if the interstate traffic could move along in the same fashion as a conveyor belt in a food processing plant?

We’ve all seen it on one of those TV shows that tell us how things are made. Somewhere inside a Kellogg’s factory there are little Cheez-It crackers moving along in perfect rhythm. They’re all traveling at the same speed. There are no brake lights causing panic. There’s no slow cracker in the left lane. No one is weaving in and out between the other crackers trying to be the first cracker in the box at the end.

I realize that my imagery falls short because the crackers themselves are idle. The belt is the thing moving. And for that reason their travel is orderly and unencumbered.

But think about it. If every vehicle on the highway traveled at precisely 70mph. If every speedometer was calibrated exactly the same. If every cruise control maintained an equal balance in vehicular speed. We’d have ourselves a conveyor belt of Cheez-Its.

Human personalities are to blame for the chaos on the interstate. It’s just inevitable. We don’t think the same. We don’t drive the same. And unless we are willing, or until we are compelled to turn our vehicles over to AI, all of us normal drivers with common sense will have to put up with the challenges of driving in traffic.

There are at least three basic types of drivers on the road. I’m sure we could create more categories than this, but these three will sum up the majority. If necessary, there is room for a few sub-categories under each type.

The first is the NASCAR driver. I’ll call him Carl. Carl thinks that he must get from point A to point B at the fastest speed possible. He considers himself a better driver than the rest of us. And though he’s never had any driver training other than what he got from Mr. Buckner’s Driver’s Ed class in 10th grade, he is convinced that he can handle the speed and any situation that might get in his way.

I can see Carl in my side mirror. He’s coming up fast. There’s a car in the left lane about twenty feet in front of me. I’m in the middle lane. A semi is to my right which I’m passing at a snail’s pace.

Carl doesn’t let off the gas. He comes by me, darts in front of me to miss the car in the left lane and moves all the way across in front of the semi in the right lane. Within moments, he guns it back through the middle lane, weaves around the next vehicle, back into the left lane. By the time he tops the next hill he’s in the right lane again. I can see his brake lights flicker just before he weaves back left.

I have learned to ignore Carl.

The second type is the oblivious driver. I’ll call her Sally. And don’t think that I am stereotyping genders here. I’m just being an equal opportunity critic.

Sally doesn’t seem to know that she is on the interstate. She also doesn’t seem to be aware of some of the basic rules designed to keep traffic flowing. She is riding in the middle lane at 62mph. I have my cruise set at 74. I move over into the right lane to pass her. Next thing I know she and I are going the same speed. She, in fact, begins to pull away.

I come up on a slower vehicle in the right lane which causes me to re-enter the middle lane behind Sally. Within a quarter mile I’m hemmed in on both sides at 62mph looking disagreeably at Sally through her rear window. When I finally get around her on the left side, I notice that she is on her phone, oblivious to anything and everything around her.

Then there is the rest of us. The normal drivers. We drive within a reasonable proximity to the posted speed limits. We actually know how to use our blinkers. We make room for the big trucks when we need to. We move over to pass and back to the right lane once we get around. We keep our distance from the car in front of us.

It’s still dark when I pull into Marion’s driveway.

“You’re early,” she says. “How was the drive?”

“Almost like Cheez-Its on a conveyor belt,” I answer.

She looked puzzled.