February 6, 2023
Greetings from this side,
No one would describe it as fair. I would say that there was no one who particularly deserved one outcome or the other, good or bad. We could apply this same thinking to many places in life, besides this concentrated example, an experience we’ve all shared at some point.
I had seen the future, it was already my past. It wasn’t something I could think about in the moment, my attention was focused on the demands in front of me.
All this from the manic chaos that is interstate 94, which threads through enough of Chicago to soak up the energy in motion from the City of Big Shoulders. I was driving west at a determined pace. Not sightseeing, not a casual errand, but rather the frantic, shoulder bunching, fists- clenching-the-steering-wheel mania that frays every nerve.
On my side of the steel barriers the traffic flowed and surged, motorists challenging each other to an endless series of duels. We slalomed between divots in the pavement and the detritus spun from other vehicles. Even as the demanding as the grind was, I daresay most everyone was grateful to be moving. We could be those other people.
On the other side of the barrier was a grim parade, a still life framed in concrete and steel.
Miles before was my past, which passed in less than a couple of minutes, and I saw their future. Several cars tangled in an awkward contemporary sculpture, already surrounded by flashing lights, uniformed people mingling in between the twisted metal and shattered glass. Behind this, in what everyone hoped was an eastward progression, there were the trapped thousands.
Above us all is a nearly uninterrupted series of billboards featuring lawyers with dramatic entreaties and, almost comically prevalent, for doctors’ offices who treat erectile dysfunction.
After a while I realized how many people were caught in the lines of cars. We had been driving for miles and there was not a break, no way for people to even escape onto a detour. In a way it was impressive, like seeing a whale breach. But on the highway.
The traffic had been stopped long enough that people were standing outside their cars, so it seemed more like a busy used car lot. I noticed a man in a black suit, dark tie, sunglasses, standing on the highway, talking on the phone. It didn’t register immediately and then I recognized he was standing by a hearse, gleaming black in the Illinois sun. Behind him stretched a motley collection of mourner’s cars, the small orange flags fixed to their hoods.
They could not see their future, the hours and miles of waiting ahead of them, held in place by a grisly test of whatever safety features we take for granted in our cars. At some time, their future selves will pass that place and wonder. Or maybe not care at all.
The hearse driver was the only person in the funeral cortege standing on the highway. I imagine the other drivers were sitting behind their wheels wondering what protocol was; is it irreverent to get out of your car when you are on the way to the cemetery? Wondering about the luncheon that was scheduled for after. Fiddling with the radio. Reading the billboard for erectile dysfunction for the tenth time.
From my side of the highway, I felt relief that I wasn’t trapped with them. “Man, I’m sure glad we’re not over there,” I said out loud, at least a few times, demonstrating not only my lack of empathy but of imagination as well. My son Harrison, sitting shotgun, counted lawyer billboards, wondered who started this trend, ignoring his father overstating obvious things.
I know that those on the other side looked at our freedom and saw the unfairness, felt like this shouldn’t be happening to them. They are good people, didn’t do anything wrong, and we are not better than them, we don’t deserve to be driving unfettered, able to pass other people and exit into gas stations, buy bottled water and Skittles.
They cycle through anger and frustration, then hope, then disappointment, anger again, and finally resignation. They will give up the lunch date, dentist appointments, cello practice, turn off the music, drum their fingers on the steering wheel.
I had forgotten the people at the crash site. All I could think of was the people in the cars behind the hearse. I think this is the saddest collection of people in the stream of metal and glass and trash and tasteless advertising and dissolving intentions. These bereaved souls, who only wanted to say the prayers and hear the words of comfort, to place the wreath, to mourn and then to try to get back to their lives.
Instead, they are trapped in a limbo. Not able to suspend grief, not able to act on it, not able to console or be consoled. Interrupted, in a time when it seemed so damn unfair that it should happen to them, when on the other side of the barrier people rushed to their frivolous overpriced coffee or Zoomba or wedding rehearsal.
None of us thought about it being fair. Those of us who were speeding west didn’t consider the question of fair or unfair, it simply was. The people trapped didn’t think it was fair, didn’t see that they should be punished simply because they got on 94 when they did, where they did.
Our lives are laced with moments like this. Some are fleeting, some are institutional, some barely recognizable, others are shown to us over and over and over again, and still we miss them, until one day we see it clearly. And perhaps we say “Man I’m sure glad we’re not over there.” And it still doesn’t occur to you that it’s fair or unfair, it simply is.
Maybe a traffic jam is a less than perfect metaphor. But very close to you are people who are trapped, maybe by bad luck or timing or one poor, innocent choice. And they slip and fall, or their doctor discovers a lump, or they are born in a poor country or their job can be done by a robot, or no one looks at them without seeing their skin color or the shape of their eyes. Maybe there is something you can offer, kindness, empathy, patience, perhaps only to acknowledge that, fair or not, you see them and want better for them.
Hope this finds you kindly,
David
Copyright © 2023 David Smith
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