I’m on the road more lately, traveling between the two cities where my heart lives. I drive up and down a two-lane highway most days, watching crops grow and leaves turn and women changing out their flower pots to reflect the seasons.
“I love to look at the flowers at this house, ” I told my love one day as we passed by together. “She changes the flowers every so often.”
“I have never even noticed that, ” he said, which was remarkable since he drives by at least twice as much as I do. The flower pots, they were so vibrant and big and many.
A few weeks later I realize I haven’t even looked at the flowers for several days. And now, glancing over as my car barrels past, the pots are empty. The cold nights and crystalline frosts caused the leaves to turn black, no doubt. A woman in love with flowers as much as she was would never leave plants with blackened leaves in the pots.
Empty, sit the pots. No flowers to notice. Not that I would anymore.
Although I do know where the policeman sits in the little town with just the one stoplight and the 30 mph speed zone. I track progress on the construction project where they are fixing a drainage issue, and I monitor how long the detour signs will remain. When those signs go down, my route will change.
The signs have always been there since I started making this trip.
I think of Jack Kerouac on the road, and his autobiographical work I could never bring myself to read. I think of all the road-trip narratives about growing up and coming of age in broken-down vans in the middle of the desert. I think road trips should be about leaving and arriving, but mine is about leaving and arriving, over and over again.
Cars pass. Or rather, people pass in cars. They drive, therefore they are. Interestingly, I’m not the only one on the road, though it feels that way.
Tires roll, pavement heats, trees and buildings and people pass by quickly, melding into smudges on a canvas that I call life.
Life on the road.
I call my mom.
I turn on the radio.
I ride in silence.
I pray.
Sometimes, when it’s dark, and I imagine the deer congregating along the shoulder of the rural highway, I change routes and find my way home on a four-lane, then six-lane, then eight-lane interstate. Sometimes I see flashing lights and twisted metal and grief in the construction zones. Once, I saw my own life flash before my eyes as I dozed off and woke to the rumble strips.
My head bobbed tiredly the rest of the way home. But at least I arrived.
The next day I left again.
Photo by Reckless Dream Photography. Creative Commons license via Flickr. Post by Charity Singleton.
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Maureen Doallas says
Even though I know how dangerous the deer along the road can be at this time of year, every time I’m driving at night and see those eyes glistening in the trees, I feel enchanted. We still have deer and rabbits, even wolves, that show up around Arlington, but especially deer. They come right up to homes. The forested area along the Potomac toward Chain Bridge is still populated with them. They are at once magnificent and trouble.
I must admit, too, that I never finished Kerouac’s ‘On the Road’.
Charity Singleton says
I have never actually had a direct deer hit, though I did run over a deer that was hit by the car in front of me. They are beautiful. In Indiana, the deer population has greatly diminished because of a disease brought on by the summer’s drought. They still scare me, though.
Monica Sharman says
What?! You mean after we’ve arrived, we have to leave again? 🙂
I thoroughly enjoyed this, Charity. Thank you. (And I, too, have blessed rumble strips.)
Charity Singleton says
Monica – Isn’t that a funny metaphor we have exacted from travel – that we have “arrived”? And oh, those rumble strips. Yes!
Susan Squires says
“Cars pass. Or rather, people pass in cars.” I love that perspective shift.
Charity Singleton says
Susan – That perspective shifts back and forth for me. Sometimes, I think I am the only one of the road, that the drivers who cut me off aren’t really people. We are a lot of loners, we who are in the car so much.
Matthew Kreider says
So well done, Charity! I recognize those roadside rhythms and visions. Maybe you could listen to Kerouac on audio? But I don’t think you need to bother. You’re already on the road. Or will be soon. 🙂
Charity Singleton says
Matthew – I’ve always felt to be a bit of a sham to call myself a reader and to even have spent a bit of time in the English department of a university and never read Kerouac. At this point, it just seems to late. But to listen to him . . . there might be something to that!
Megan Willome says
This is prose poetry, Charity. I love this, like pulling up a window shade to see into one view of your life.
(And deer are a menace. They kill perfectly innocent cars.)
Charity Singleton says
Megan, I like that: prose poetry. Sometimes, a little stream of consciousness is just what a person needs! (and yes, menace is a good word!)
Diana Trautwein says
I loved this. LOVED it. Can almost here the clickety-clack of the road and the thrum of those rumble strips. And so sweet to read the words ‘my love’ in this particular reverie. I just somehow feel content reading it. Thanks for that – cuz life is a bit cruddy these days and contentment is in short supply.
Charity Singleton says
Diana – I’m sorry about the “cruddiness” of life just now. It’s interesting that you mention contentment, because I think I started writing this post because I was discontent with all the time on the road, though I am completely content with the reasons for my driving. When I started writing about it, I realized that these times in the car might be accomplishing something *in* me, not just moving me from one place to the next.
Shar Boerema says
Charity, I feel the loss of your ” love”… and the corresponding emptiness. Beautiful writing.
Charity Singleton says
Shar – Thanks for commenting and for your encouragement! Thankfully, the only loss I currently am experiencing with my “love” is that I have to go home at the end of the day, and so does he. But we very much love the time we are spending together.
Ann Kroeker says
I love being on the road with you, Charity, here in this piece, and when we chat, the times you check in with me. Now I will imagine the flowers flying past when we’re chatting about our lives and loves.
Jan Cole says
I loved this post, Charity, and I sure do miss you.