Let the missed exit stay missed

There is a moment, just as the exit sign slides past, when a small mistake asks you to make a big one. The ramp is right there; three lanes and two seconds might still reach it. If you miss your exit, take the next one — never swerve or cut across traffic to rescue an exit that’s already gone. Many people offering this advice make the same plain point, and one was struck by how many drivers it hasn’t occurred to that another exit is coming.

What makes this tip bigger than driving is the shape of the error. The missed exit is a finished mistake — it already happened, it’s behind you, and its entire price is a short detour one person rebranded as accidental sightseeing. The dive across three lanes is a new mistake, made at speed, in front of strangers who have no reason to expect it — spending safety to buy back time the first mistake already spent. The panicked merge-back has cousins, all worse: stopping dead in a live lane, reversing along a shoulder. Every one converts a few minutes of inconvenience into genuine danger.

The fix is a decision made in advance, because nobody reasons well at 65 miles an hour with a ramp disappearing in the mirror: I miss it, I take the next one. Said once, calmly, it’s there when you need it — and the missed exit becomes what it always actually was. A slightly longer way home.