It's Christmas time and we all know what that means: crass sonsumerism. Yeah, in today's world the Christmas season has many reasons -- from buying stuff to celebrating the birth of Jesus and time with family -- but somewhere in that hierarchy of meaning a bit lower than presents and tad higher than Jesus is the beauty of the human spirit that shines so true during this time of year, especially on the roads...in lieu of not wanting to write anything else (or for the fact the next of my essays, this one on love, is taking me forever to write), I will post a story I wrote a few years back. Please don't mind the all lower-case style, I was an e.e.cummings wannabe at the time.
'tis the season
it is december 20 and i am driving home down a busy city street. i think to myself how ironic it is that so many celebrate the only day where most stores are closed, closed because they are letting their employees celebrate the birth of their Lord, by giving those businesses a good third of their yearly business in one month’s time. purging wallets, i guess, of their money – the root of all evil – in hopes of showing appreciation for a God that gave them life everlasting but maybe only using the day as an excuse for having others fill up empty closets and offering to help fill the closets of others. one cold make the argument that i don’t help with that irony much either, but i know that others feed the beast so much more than i do. i suppose i could do more, or at least something else, maybe volunteer my time, maybe...
but the light that i have been stuck at through my thoughts turns green and all thoughts are lost as i slam my right foot down on the accelerator. i frantically attempt to cut in front of the woman to in the left lane because i see a truck ten car-lengths ahead of me approaching another light that will inevitably change by the time we get there. my God that’s the last thing I need is to lose a minute stuck behind a semi that can’t accelerate even half as fast as I do. i need that minute – it’s that much more time to push off the inevitable task of wrapping the gifts that fill the passenger seat to my right. i know it doesn’t make sense to race so that i can procrastinate, but the irony of shopping to celebrate the birth of Jesus re-enters my mind and i forget it. but all thoughts are lost as i approach the now yellow-turning light having succeeded in cutting in front of the woman in the left lane and receiving a congratulatory gesture of a single finger for my deeds. i return the salute.
i stop at the light, her behind me waving her hands at me in disgust. i look at her in the rear view mirror, laugh to myself, then shrug it all off. why get worked up about that sort of thing? there just isn’t enough time in life to get all worried about someone cutting you off on the road. hell, there isn’t enough time to worry about much in life that people seem to worry about...schedules, blasphemers, rudeness, it all seems so frivolous and non-personal. why should we care?
the light goes green and again my thoughts return to the road, this time to getting to the right lane because the woman behind me has moved beyond hand gestures to honking at every opportunity and flashing her headlights just to piss me off. i cut in front of the truck to my right which doesn’t seem to upset the driver as i’m accelerating twice as fast as he. i drive on, my mind free of thoughts as i look around at the shops on either side of the road. they move past quickly as traffic is now moving faster on this stretch of road with a mile or more in between busy intersections with their guardian signals above them. shoe shops, clothes shops, bookstores, and restaurants, all dressed up in pretty ribbons standing in wait for the masses to come in and buy all that they have for sale. i shake my head as i remember my days of working in these stores, having managers and owners get excited about all the business that they’ll do over the five week shopping season. moving displays by fractions of inches, they’d do anything to make sure that everything’s perfect, that everything screams out “buy me!” and that people develop a sense of need in the frivolous and otherwise useless items on the shelves. i almost cry at the way people are so manipulated and the way that i partook in that manipulation for so long.
but a car honks and those thoughts are lost as i whip my head around to see if i were the one whose attention was trying to be grabbed. i wasn’t.
i giggle to myself as i notice that the radio voice is singing of being “comfortably numb” and i am anything but. i wish i was numb, but that must wait, now i must battle this beast of a road.
traffic slows and i notice the light ahead is red. i’ll be lucky to get through in two cycles, let alone the green that will come after cross-traffic has its turn. i sit back and try to relax though my instincts tell me to shove down the accelerator and race to the red light. ahead of me, traffic is moving, behind me, it wants to. in the drive of the gas station before me is a car with a man behind the wheel with his left-turn signal blinking, trying to get across two lanes of traffic to the temporary safety of the center lane where he can wait to get into traffic himself and continue on home.
though i am rushed, i know it does me no good to race to the light so i, in the right lane, stop for this poor damned soul whose only mistake is trying to turn the wrong way down a busy street. i stop, those behind me honking, wanting me to move forward so that i can stop again a hundred feet down the way. instead of stopping, some veer to the left to join the traffic, including the lady who flipped me off – now repeating the gesture – racing towards that stop. one lane not moving, the other filled with cars lurching forward towards their inevitable halt, the man trying to go home is stuck where he is. the left lane stops moving, cars bumper to bumper from the light to somewhere beyond the reach of my side mirror. there is no way through for the man i tried to help and so i have i have no choice but to shrug my shoulders and step on the gas, not able to help another human being during the holidays because others are unwilling to help me help. he returns the shrug in a way that says “thanks anyway” and i drive past. raising an eyebrow, i look at him and even though he can’t hear me, i wish him a merry christmas.
'tis the season
it is december 20 and i am driving home down a busy city street. i think to myself how ironic it is that so many celebrate the only day where most stores are closed, closed because they are letting their employees celebrate the birth of their Lord, by giving those businesses a good third of their yearly business in one month’s time. purging wallets, i guess, of their money – the root of all evil – in hopes of showing appreciation for a God that gave them life everlasting but maybe only using the day as an excuse for having others fill up empty closets and offering to help fill the closets of others. one cold make the argument that i don’t help with that irony much either, but i know that others feed the beast so much more than i do. i suppose i could do more, or at least something else, maybe volunteer my time, maybe...
but the light that i have been stuck at through my thoughts turns green and all thoughts are lost as i slam my right foot down on the accelerator. i frantically attempt to cut in front of the woman to in the left lane because i see a truck ten car-lengths ahead of me approaching another light that will inevitably change by the time we get there. my God that’s the last thing I need is to lose a minute stuck behind a semi that can’t accelerate even half as fast as I do. i need that minute – it’s that much more time to push off the inevitable task of wrapping the gifts that fill the passenger seat to my right. i know it doesn’t make sense to race so that i can procrastinate, but the irony of shopping to celebrate the birth of Jesus re-enters my mind and i forget it. but all thoughts are lost as i approach the now yellow-turning light having succeeded in cutting in front of the woman in the left lane and receiving a congratulatory gesture of a single finger for my deeds. i return the salute.
i stop at the light, her behind me waving her hands at me in disgust. i look at her in the rear view mirror, laugh to myself, then shrug it all off. why get worked up about that sort of thing? there just isn’t enough time in life to get all worried about someone cutting you off on the road. hell, there isn’t enough time to worry about much in life that people seem to worry about...schedules, blasphemers, rudeness, it all seems so frivolous and non-personal. why should we care?
the light goes green and again my thoughts return to the road, this time to getting to the right lane because the woman behind me has moved beyond hand gestures to honking at every opportunity and flashing her headlights just to piss me off. i cut in front of the truck to my right which doesn’t seem to upset the driver as i’m accelerating twice as fast as he. i drive on, my mind free of thoughts as i look around at the shops on either side of the road. they move past quickly as traffic is now moving faster on this stretch of road with a mile or more in between busy intersections with their guardian signals above them. shoe shops, clothes shops, bookstores, and restaurants, all dressed up in pretty ribbons standing in wait for the masses to come in and buy all that they have for sale. i shake my head as i remember my days of working in these stores, having managers and owners get excited about all the business that they’ll do over the five week shopping season. moving displays by fractions of inches, they’d do anything to make sure that everything’s perfect, that everything screams out “buy me!” and that people develop a sense of need in the frivolous and otherwise useless items on the shelves. i almost cry at the way people are so manipulated and the way that i partook in that manipulation for so long.
but a car honks and those thoughts are lost as i whip my head around to see if i were the one whose attention was trying to be grabbed. i wasn’t.
i giggle to myself as i notice that the radio voice is singing of being “comfortably numb” and i am anything but. i wish i was numb, but that must wait, now i must battle this beast of a road.
traffic slows and i notice the light ahead is red. i’ll be lucky to get through in two cycles, let alone the green that will come after cross-traffic has its turn. i sit back and try to relax though my instincts tell me to shove down the accelerator and race to the red light. ahead of me, traffic is moving, behind me, it wants to. in the drive of the gas station before me is a car with a man behind the wheel with his left-turn signal blinking, trying to get across two lanes of traffic to the temporary safety of the center lane where he can wait to get into traffic himself and continue on home.
though i am rushed, i know it does me no good to race to the light so i, in the right lane, stop for this poor damned soul whose only mistake is trying to turn the wrong way down a busy street. i stop, those behind me honking, wanting me to move forward so that i can stop again a hundred feet down the way. instead of stopping, some veer to the left to join the traffic, including the lady who flipped me off – now repeating the gesture – racing towards that stop. one lane not moving, the other filled with cars lurching forward towards their inevitable halt, the man trying to go home is stuck where he is. the left lane stops moving, cars bumper to bumper from the light to somewhere beyond the reach of my side mirror. there is no way through for the man i tried to help and so i have i have no choice but to shrug my shoulders and step on the gas, not able to help another human being during the holidays because others are unwilling to help me help. he returns the shrug in a way that says “thanks anyway” and i drive past. raising an eyebrow, i look at him and even though he can’t hear me, i wish him a merry christmas.
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