Wednesday

My knee hurts, and this rampant commuter traffic, this stop-and-go repetition, is only making the issue worse. These other drivers don't seem to mind drifting all over the place, either. Their every move is a miscalculated stumble into the other lane as they occupy themselves with other, more pressing things.

There's a man shaving three cars back. He's singing something, Bruce Springsteen, maybe--he looks like a Bruce guy--and his back and forth movements on the road are mirrored by the way his Norelco razor sweeps left to right under his chin to get those harder to clip whiskers. Another woman is apparently blessed with the ability to steer her car with a highly evolved clitoris because it appears that she's propped her cell phone on one knee and is feeding herself an everything bagel with the other, all while keeping both hands busy doing her make-up in the rearview mirror pointed at her face. She's been coming into my lane periodically for the entire trip. I'd give her the finger, but she wouldn't notice anyway. Her baby-on-board placard would be blocking the view.

My knee is clicking--hard. It's got an unpleasant rice crispies quality about it this morning because I jammed it into a toilet seat. A toilet seat... I think I might try out for the Strongman competition sometime next week. I'm clearly ready. I went to put up the lid, but stupidly just kind of tossed it upwards off of the porcelain instead of making sure it was set in its upright and locked position. As I realized that it was coming back down, I had a knee-jerk reaction--literally--and went to block it from crashing back in place and waking up my girlfriend. Instead of stopping it, I caught it at exactly the right point in its descent to jam it right into the tendon between my knee cap and shin bone. It made a pop that I heard and felt and I quickly recoiled in agony. Naturally, the seat continued to fall and the noise woke her up, ousted her out of what would've normally been a decent night's sleep and put her in the strange position of having her boyfriend explain to her, at three in the morning, just how he managed to injure himself with a toilet seat. She's a saint, but even that pushed her buttons. Not that I blame her, though. If I was jolted awake to find her in the same condition, I'd like a better explanation than, "I'm such an idiot," too.

While spending time in the car, I've thought about how many dumb injuries I've had over the course of my life and how I'm lucky to be in one, mostly functional, piece. Some incidents were bloody, some were cleaner, but a glorious lack of forethought on my part is what they all have in common. I've had over half a dozen concussions from incidents ranging from bike rides into palm trees in Florida, to aluminum baseball bats striking the back of my skull. One of my favorites was when my oldest cousin and I were pillow fighting. I was armed with a decorative throw pillow, complete with an orange crocheted flower. He had a sofa cushion, donning burn marks on the underside that were probably unknown to my aunt. At one point, he popped out of the utility room in their nearly pitch-black basement and clotheslined me, sending my feet flying and my head smashing into the concrete floor. Without any hesitation, he came rushing over to put his hand over my mouth, which was open and catching tears but had no sound coming out yet. "Shhh shhh shhh, you'll be ok. You're ok. You're FINE, right? Don't tell my mom." That was concussion number three, I believe.

There are others that I can't really remember, though I'm told they were hilarious. I guess that's just how it goes. You keep the memorable ones, the real stupid ones, and the rest just disappear like the cars around me that may have swerved into my lane a few times but were bested by those that deserved a good honking. The ones being steered by a vagina.

It's tough to not think of stupid accidents on this road. This particular highway doesn't allow trucks, so cars seem to compensate by driving ninety miles-per-hour. A while back, I was curious to find out what kind of carnage took place on this two-lane chute in a given time period. Apparently, in a two year span from 1997-1999, there was an average of roughly 100 accidents per mile of this 37.6 mile highway. That was ten years ago, now. I can't imagine how that's progressed with the dawn of handheld GPS, iPods, and cheap Subway footlong sandwiches.

Now, though, it's slow-going and twenty miles an hour gives you a chance to really think about this stuff, especially since there's an accident up ahead and I already know that it's not even on my side of the road. People are checking out the crash remnants, surveying the debris and the anger and anguish of those involved. Their faces get lit up as they ride past those red and blue lights and they bask in it like some spring shower that caught them while they were jogging. They feel refreshed by it almost. Maybe they're refreshed because it's not them who's climbing out of the jagged metal. Or maybe it's just refreshing to see someone else suffer for a change. With all the narcissism that floats around a commuter highway, the latter wouldn't surprise me.

I stop and look along with them, though. If things are already moving slow anyway, I might as well see why. As far as accidents go, it's a large one. There's a new Toyota that's flipped over. It's silver with a baby-on-board sticker in the window. "Toyotas are safe cars," I say to myself. This is based on nothing, really. The car is inverted, with windows broken out and bumpers missing, but it just looked safe. It looked like it cradled that baby in its padded steel arms while it rolled over time and again. It's refreshing to think about that as I drive past and see the tear-streaked mother bracing herself on the arm of a police officer as she watches firemen ready the jaws of life to get into the rear passenger side of the car.

Over another hill, which my father once told me used to be the rolling mounds of a landfill, and the scene is gone and replaced with snow-covered pines and dormant hardwoods that line this especially beautiful stretch of road. My knee pops and throbs but it's better than it was without the quick start-stop. The man shaving and the woman mysteriously controlling her car are long gone. They're off to endanger other drivers on fortunately slower roads. They'll be back after happy hour though, I'm sure.