I was going to turn left into a grocery store parking lot to pick up a few things, but that light in particular doesn’t have a green arrow and sometimes it’s hard to see if there’s traffic coming from the other direction when there’s somebody trying to turn left as well from the other side of the intersection.
I had thought that everything was clear, but apparently the other car must’ve been floating in the blind spot of another car trying to turn left because I didn’t see him until I was already in the middle of the lane.
I still don’t really know how we didn’t collide – I could see him coming at me, almost seemingly in slow motion, to the point where I remember wincing and bracing for the impact … and yet instead of crumpled metal, apparently I also hit the gas and he swerved and slammed on his breaks because a second later I had cleared the intersection and my car was still thankfully in one piece.
I sat in the parking space for a good couple of minutes before I went in, partially thinking that someone was going to come in after me about what had happened, but aside from his squealing tires just before we didn’t collide, that’s all that I ever heard from the other driver. I even took a look around the back of my car when I did get out just to see if maybe he had nicked me and I hadn’t felt it or something, but there was nothing.
There’s even another light maybe 1/4 mile up that has an extra turn lane and green arrows, so I guess I’ll just use that from now on unless it’s painstakingly clear that there’s no one coming from the other direction. One close call is enough for me! 😕