driving in traffic

The road is slow.  It twists like a shirking shoulder. The cars seem to float; tiny pretend boats with bells in a water trough.  And although the cars are moving slowly, about 50 mph, the thoughts in my mind are racing. 

The thoughts stomp like giants.  They twist like tornadoes. They bash and crash and wiz by.  Be here, get there, do this, do that, then get there, and be here again, do that, do that again, don't forget this or that, oh god don't forget that...

And a little voice from deep within my head whispers, what is the point of any of this? 

That is the voice I react to. No, no, no, nooooo! Don't ask that question when we are doing so well! 

My house is spotless.  Our meals are all shopped for and planned.  The dogs are walked.  The children are happy.  I am dressed, all organized and going on as planned.

But it is a good question.

Why are any of us doing anything?

Two by two, the cars roll down the shrugging shoulder of the interstate.  The road straightens out their speed increases.  The mountains in their winter coats rise into view. 

The breath of Autumn breathes down on the valley and the air is so clear... but I don't know what the point is.  I never have known.  Perhaps that's what makes me me.   

When the days are fast I forget that I don't know.  I forget that I don't see the cathedral we are building only the rules of the blueprints.  I am one of those chosen to live in life in doubt.

I have moments when I think I know.  Standing in the center of a dead dirt road watching Juneau's tail flash through the golden grasses as he breaks across the openness.  Flashes of red and white in the mountain meadow.  The smell of pine needles bedded in the cooling ground.  This is why; to heal a broken dog.

People aren't so simple to help.  Like Beach and gymnastics...it's hard to see the point when it is stabbing you in the gut.

I drive in the traffic as it thins.  Don't forget this, and do that, pick up this, make that. go there, be back by then, do it again...

I pass the exits I have been taking and not taking my whole life.  I am ready to move on from here.  Ready to follow BC somewhere quieter, somewhere older.  Towards a larger sky and a new history.

The cars float on and off the interstate.  I drive.  The giants stomp.  The tornadoes whirl.  They bash and they crash.  I take my exit and I go on.