Through the Booth

The traffic never really stops. It thins sometimes, usually late at night or early morning, but it does not disappear. Even when the booths are quiet, there is always the sense that the next car is already on its way. I supervise a stretch of toll booths on a long-haul route, which mostly means I watch patterns repeat until they blur.

I track shifts carefully. Who is coming in tired. Who has been pulling extra hours. Who needs to be rotated before irritation turns into mistakes. The work looks simple from the outside. Cars arrive. Payments go through. Gates lift. But repetition has weight. It settles into you slowly.

Coins jam the machines more often in damp weather. I can tell how the day is going to go by the sound the first jam makes. A dull clunk instead of a clean drop. I walk over, open the panel, clear it, reset the machine. My hands move automatically. I have done it enough times that I could probably do it in the dark.

Drivers rarely look at me. Their eyes stay forward or flick past like I am part of the equipment. I do not take it personally. Most of them are somewhere else already. Still, being unseen day after day changes how you feel in a space.

I tell myself the job is steady, and it is. There is comfort in knowing what comes next. There is also fatigue in knowing it too well. The same motions. The same sounds. The same short exchanges that never develop into anything else.

I spend a lot of time standing still while everything else moves. Cars stream through in bursts. Engines idle. Tires hiss on wet pavement. I stay put, adjusting when needed, watching the flow correct itself after small disruptions. The work requires attention, but not imagination. That can be harder than it sounds.

By mid-shift, my legs feel heavy. Not sore, just weighted. I shift my stance and stretch when I can. I remind myself to drink water. Supervising means being present without being in the way. I step in when something breaks down, then fade back again.

The repetition seeps in quietly. I notice it when I replay the same moments without meaning to. The same hand reaching for a lever. The same driver hesitating before pulling forward. The same pause while a machine resets. It is not dramatic. It is persistent.

At the end of a shift, I sign off reports and walk the line one last time. The booths glow under artificial light. The road hums. I take a breath before heading out, letting the noise settle into something familiar instead of overwhelming.

Some nights are harder than others. Weather plays a role. So does volume. When traffic stacks up, small delays turn into pressure quickly. I watch for signs of strain in the booth attendants. A clipped tone. A missed signal. Those moments matter.

During a slower stretch one evening, while monitoring a maintenance alert, I pulled out my phone just to get away. I read this post which matched some of the emotions I Was feeling. Then put the phone away and adjusted the rotation so one attendant could step out of the booth for a few minutes. The line evened out, and the flow recovered without comment.

The rest of the shift followed that adjustment. Fewer jams. Fewer sharp exchanges. The routine settled back into its groove. I stayed alert without hovering, letting the system do what it usually does when it is not pushed too hard.

I have learned that small changes matter more than big ones here. You cannot stop the traffic. You can only smooth its edges. That applies to people too. Short breaks. Clear instructions. Predictable responses.

As the night went on, the damp air made everything feel heavier. Coins stuck more often. Gates lifted slower. I moved between booths with a practiced rhythm, fixing what needed fixing and moving on. The repetition kept my mind occupied even as my body grew tired.

There is a point in every shift where I ask myself whether the routine is holding me steady or wearing me down. The answer changes depending on the night. Sometimes the predictability is a relief. Sometimes it feels like erosion.

I do not dwell on it while I am working. Dwelling slows you down. I focus on the next issue, the next signal, the next jam. The job rewards attention, not reflection.

When the shift finally winds down, the reduction in traffic feels almost unreal. The silence between cars stretches longer. I stand there a moment longer than necessary, watching the road empty and refill at its own pace.

After work, the noise follows me longer than it used to. Not the sound itself, but the rhythm of it. Stop. Go. Pause. Repeat. It plays in the background while I do ordinary things. I have learned not to fight it. Fighting makes it louder.

I think about routine more now. How it can steady you by removing decisions. How it can also flatten days together until they are hard to separate. I am still deciding where it lands for me.

The job asks for reliability more than anything else. Show up. Pay attention. Fix problems quickly. I do those things well. What I am less sure about is how much of myself I want wrapped up in that steadiness.

Some people thrive on repetition. Others chafe against it. I seem to live somewhere in between. The routine keeps me grounded, but it also presses down slowly, like traffic that never fully clears.

I try to notice the small differences between shifts. A different sky. A different pattern of jams. A different tone in the air. Those details help the days feel less interchangeable.

Tomorrow, I will track shifts again. I will clear jams. I will watch the flow and step in when needed. The routine will hold, because it always does.

Whether it holds me up or wears me down is something I am still learning. For now, I stand where the road narrows, steady in place, letting everything else move past.