I started driving today

Today I got into my 1996 Buick Le Sabre and started driving. Lots of people like the two-lane highways. They're friendlier. You stop and it looks like you're somewhere different from the last time you stopped. I like that. But I also like the Interstates. Impersonal, massive. Grey. Every stop on them looks the same as every other stop. They feel like the world.

I picked a destination: De Forest, Wisconsin. Almost one straight shot on I-90. About seven hours. That's where I am now. De Forest. Motel.

I parked the car at the Culver's and walked over to the overpass. Couple of blocks. I found what amounted to a frontage road, and sat in some bushes to watch the cars. There are a lot of cars that go by on the Interstate. And a lot that stop in De Forest, actually. There are many fine fast food eating establishments within 60 seconds of the Interstate here in De Forest.

It's good to think about all those people. In the cars, I mean. Thousands, passing by. Their cars go fast. No one knows each other. No one knows what De Forest is like. I don't know what De Forest is like. It feels good, and it feels terrible to be somewhere like that.

As I sat in the bushes and felt cold, I thought of a conversation I once had with a friend in Canada. I had call waiting, and so I told him to hang on for a second because there was a call coming in. I clicked over; nothing, just some hissing. "Hello?" Nothing. "This is Horace. Hello?" Nothing. I thought of the distance, and all the many thousands of conversations, carried roughly at the speed of light through the many hundreds of miles of telephone wire. And there were voices I could not hear in the quiet hissing. I clicked back to my friend. "No one was there." But everyone was there. Or at least, a lot of people were there.

Back to this afternoon in De Forest, in the bushes. I was getting cold, but I was glad that I was just watching the Interstate and not listening to the phone line. More accessible. I walked back to my car. I thought about buying a salad at Culver's, but this seemed like just too much. So I drove into town, ate at a place called the Pizza Pit, and then found the motel. And here I am.

In His Most Holy Name.

Horace.