Commuting

After a few days of trying various routes, you settle on one that cuts through the wealthy neighborhood to the two-lane street in town, tree-lined and heavy with traffic but moving. Trees stand at attention on either side, all the way down, making for a more pleasant commute than the alternatives—namely, the one past the coin laundry, the seedy motel, the strip joint and the check cashing shop; and the other, congested with university traffic, taxi cabs, and mini-vans driven by parents running their late children to private school. It’s a 20-minute commute to the highway, 15 to your final exit, five from the Waffle House to the company lot. Over time, the drive becomes thoughtless, as if each turn and change of lane has been etched into your DNA.

Once the route becomes automatic in this way, the subtleties of your commute sharpen into focus—how the same hatchback winds up in front of you, for instance, often at a particular light, so that one day, when you catch a glint of sun off its metallic surface, you speed up just to make sure the purple bumper sticker is still there, faded and peeling at one side. There is a sense of belonging to this road, that car, these trees and houses—a dominion of pavement, homes, parks, and restaurants.

What surprises you most is the connection felt to the people you pass daily, a select few. It begins with the woman who jogs as if walking, wearing the same black shorts and top each day. You are impressed by her commitment—more to the jogging than the outfit—and the apparent lack of concern to be anywhere else, her easy and relaxed brow, a plentitude of breath. You vow to start exercising tomorrow after work, no matter how tired or thirsty for beer you may be.

Another woman, just down the road, in office clothes and a long, smooth ponytail: each day she looks only at the ground, smiling to herself over something, you don’t know what, like a child. There she goes, carrying her bags: one canvas and full of books, presumably, the others a plastic grocery bag of food and a purse. You watch for a few seconds as the light cycles from green to red and back again, taking one last look as the line of cars begins to move. She goes on, always smiling, always looking down.

And then the two bearded men. The first you pass, spotting his steady, hard-pressed gait as your car rises over the hill by the filling station. His hands extend sideways, fingers slightly curled, and he too looks down, mumbling to himself. He wears a yarmulke, a t-shirt tucked and jeans. He has no newspaper or book, no backpack or briefcase. Lines gather at the corner of his eyes because of a smile caught somewhere between anger and joy. You worry that he’s ready to come unglued at any moment, to anyone sitting at the bus stop, walking by, or passing in a car.

The last of the regulars is an older man, shaggy haired and gaunt. He drinks coffee as he walks, usually near the on-ramp. He is dirty but in different clothes than the day before, most days, in fact. Because of the rugged lines of his nose, cheek bones and long-focused gaze, you imagine he was once a sailor of some kind—out of Conrad or Melville, hard-weathered and melancholy as the sea. There is nothing discernible in his face, though his gray eyes are bright with resignation.

But, when you finally get to the office, the construction workers have torn up a new section of the parking lot. They are drilling holes for lampposts, and have parked a port-o-john in your usual spot. You hope, as you pull the badge from your messenger bag to unlock the door that, for now, nothing else will change too much. That you will make it up the stairs and through to five o’clock just as easily as you came to work— somehow without realizing—unconcerned about whether or not you will one day soon need to find an alternate route.