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The way traffic merges is a fair metaphor for society.
When all is going well, two lanes become one like a zipper. Cooperation, fairness and trust allow humankind to overcome a shared inconvenience in the most efficient manner possible. Taking turns, that is about as basic as it gets.
There will always be a certain percentage of people who rock the boat by cutting ahead or refusing to yield, but imagine if we all did. It would be chaos. Same for society if we all decided to cheat, steal and kill.
This was the theory we trotted out every time a Kula grandmother we know complained about a merge lane at the Five Trees intersection below King Kekaulike High School. After picking her grandkids up from another school, she was often waylaid in traffic while headed uphill on Haleakala Highway. Normally mild-mannered and full of aloha, she would describe how angry drivers on Old Haleakala Highway would get when she refused to let them merge.
Our conversations may as well have been spoken in different languages for as much consensus as we found over the years.
"Just let them in."
"You don't understand!"
The proverbial light bulb went on last week while we were trying to reach Kamehameha Schools Maui during the after-school rush. The traffic signals at Five Trees would turn green, but the quagmire ahead meant the uphill line of vehicles had nowhere to go. Whatever gap that opened up while the lights were red would quickly be filled by cars zipping up Old Haleakala Highway.
After a few cycles of light changes without moving more than a car length, we too began to resent those drivers jumping ahead. We calmed ourselves by reasoning it wasn't their fault they escaped all the pain and suffering the rest of us were going through. There was open space and they took it.
The ethical wrestling match came 10 minutes later when we made it through the intersection and it was our turn to yield to a driver on the right who had spent all of 15 seconds in line. What did they know about sacrifice? Electing to walk the talk, we let them in.
A similar afternoon tie-up happens lately where Maui Veterans Highway becomes Puunene Avenue in Kahului. Traffic turning right off Hookele Street by Zippy's fills the lanes waiting at the Honoapiilani Highway intersection. The light at Hookele turns green and traffic coming from Kihei has nowhere to go.
By far, these are not the only two problem areas on Maui.
That brings up one final part of the merge metaphor. Society functions best when its government and infrastructure are organized and well run. We can merge with the best of them, but it is not too much to ask to have our traffic lights properly synchronized and to have chronic bottlenecks identified and mitigated.