Tuesday

Summer's over now, which means that I'm being shoved off of the highway and onto backroads much sooner during my morning drive. I used to be able to make it all the way to my exit on the highway, but now it's like the whole world has been jerked back into reality and they all meet in the morning to trudge the beaten trail together.

I always think it's interesting how so many people are trying to progress in the same direction but yet they have no idea how to do it faster than a snail's pace. Some mornings I hit the road and think that through some miraculous turn of events traffic will be both voluminous and simultaneously forging ahead at a steady clip. But then again, I haven't had coffee first thing in the morning in a while now and it might be seriously affecting my brain. Without fail, there is nothing miraculous about traffic these days, except its undaunting ability to morph me into a frustrated mess behind a fist-pounded steering wheel. So in order to avoid aneurysm, I flee the collapsing hoard, that beacon of vehicular incompetence, and take to slower and calmer roads with whoever else decided that the longevity of their sanity was more valuable than a straight(er) shot to their destination.

The back roads are really nice, though. Perhaps even a little too relaxing for those without a healthy dose of caffeine in their system. I slither between sprawling estates with manicured landscapes and scoot underneath bowing canopies that have tangled, over time, to create miniature tunnel systems that mute the sunlight and disrupt my satellite radio reception. I dodge those small plastic signs designed to look like children warning me to drive slow as I pass the country club's tennis court crosswalk. Very rarely is anyone out that early, but the heated tennis court is still steaming off the morning dew in anticipation. There are school buses that slow everything down, but they dip in and out of so many neighborhoods that time spent behind them is relatively fleeting. A few flashes of the red and yellow and they're gone. The traffic cop at the high school recognizes me now and we exchange waves as he motions me to continue. He's got a wild behavior about him that aides in his ability to usher oncoming traffic in multiple directions but not control his temper when disobeyed. He's laced into a few drivers who tested his patience, always turning back in my direction to shake his head after his angry diatribe and point me on my way.

As annoying as it is to be forced off of the easy route every morning, the back roads give me a chance to prepare and relax before I have to start my day. I don't have to worry about people floating into my lane, or slamming on my brakes to avoid sitting in someone's back seat. My biggest concern is trying to quickly get a look at the sky so my Sirius won't fizzle out as much. Truth be told, if I have to choose between intermittent satellite reception or wanting to punch the nearest living thing once I finally exit my car after an arduous highway excursion, I'll take to the woods any day.

The trick now is to just try and keep it a secret as best I can and let the crazies duke it out along their dotted lines.

Monday

I'd say roughly 95% of everyone I drive past in the morning is a vice commutor.

Some smoke cigarettes, some smoke weed. Some drink coffee, some drink redbull, some tip flasks. Some people do blow off of CD cases, some pop pills. Some people masturbate, some... yes, some masturbate.

It takes a while to start recognizing the same people, but after getting to the highway between 7:40 and 7:45 for nearly a year, familiar faces begin to emerge from the crowd. That woman who smokes Parliaments, but bites the paper foreskin off the filter before she does, always gets on at Main Street. The guy who packs a bowl at Park and hits it passing the gas station is there most mornings. He works with computers, I think (or steals monitors and keeps them in his back seat). There's another guy who gets on at 42 who dumps his shiny boot flask into his coffee. I'm sure I don't have to tell you that the masturbator is easy to spot once you recognize what's going on.

This trend isn't isolated to a few drivers, either, and that makes sense. These habits help us get through that part of the morning. For me, it's coffee, Howard Stern (with some channel changes during commercials), and the occasional cigarette. Mess with any of that, and I'd be upset about it. That time belongs to me. There are very few instances outside of my commute and my bathroom where time belongs to just me. I fill that hour or so with caffiene, nicotine, and raunchy humor. It's perfect.

I imagine most people are like that. They need those familiar, bad habit, routine elements to start their day. It's their reward for getting up. Or, in some cases, it's a way to deal with what they're getting up for. I could empathize with either view.

Does the woman smoking the cigarettes need them to calm herself down before taking a seat at her desk or waltzing into a meeting? Or is she just bored and that gives her something to do? Does the pot cloud or clear the guy's head? Either would immediately reveal how he feels about his job. Same goes for our boozing friend. And for the masturbator (as if we could forget), maybe it reminds her of the night before, or a night she wishes she could have. Or maybe she just wants to do something dirty with her hand before she punches the clock at the local franchise and keeps it stuffed and suffocated in a latex glove while she serves sandwiches and coffee. In the end, though, it's their time to spend without the need for justifications.

I can understand all of those scenarios. I can because we're all basically the same. We all merge into that giant snake every morning and need something--anything--to do with ourselves before we break off, minutes or hours later, to go about our own business. It's a strange portal, the highway. You get so used to it and its ways, its routine, that you need to separate from it with something of your own. You sip coffee and laugh at the radio. You sing as loud as you can and drum on the steering wheel. You blow smoke at it all. You rub one out. Anything to avoid letting the monotony suck you in and strip you of who you are.

The saddest thing you can see on the road at 8:03 in the morning is someone sitting in a silent car doing nothing at all.

Friday

The fuzz stole my sunglasses.

Well, they stole my car's sunglasses. I had bought my zoom-zooming Mazda 6s a few years ago as a used car that had been turned in by a lease holder. It was a rainy day, really not the best to be car shopping, but the car really caught my eye. Bright white with dark as night tinted windows. I remember thinking that they couldn't possibly be legal, but I honestly didn't care. The car was sexy and I wanted it. Up until 2 months ago, not a word was said (from anyone with a badge, anyway) about those windows.

As most stories like this go, the police eventually called me out on them. I blame the economy and their need for a quick and easy buck. The officer carefully strutted up to my driver's side window with his hand on his gun and the flashlight in my eyes. "Sorry, I can't tell if there's anyone else in there." I could already tell where this was going. He checked the tint level with a little electronic device that measured how much light would transmit through the glass. He told me they were "13," which was always my lucky number, and thus horrendously illegal. However, he said that if I removed them, I could easily get the ticket thrown out in court. Begrudgingly, I removed them myself and now have to deal with this new sensation I'm experiencing.

I feel so naked. I mean, I'm not a highway mastubator or compulsive nose picker, but I feel like all of my in-car privacy has been stripped away. People look at me now. That's the really big part of it. People would look before but I could tell that they were just trying to see what was inside, but to no avail. Now, they look at me and it's so strange to look to my side in rush hour traffic and meet the gaze of some person staring right back at me. I've lost my on-road anonymity and I don't like it. It's much more disturbing than I thought it would be. My first car didn't have tinted windows at all, so I thought nothing of it when people would look. But having driven a car that offers complete and utter privacy for three years and then losing that, it just feels strange to have this exposure. I also want to note that this is not some vain narcissism, an "Oh! Everyone is looking at me!" type of thing. People look at you when you drive. Not all the time, but enough that it gets awkward in slow rush hour traffic.

The sun, too. Jesus! When did the sun get so bright? When I lowered myself into the driver's seat and shut the door on the clearest blue day in the middle of summer, it was as if I had entered a 220hp cave with satelite radio. It was comfortably dim. I still wore sunglasses, but only when facing directly into the light. Otherwise, they were unnecessary until I ventured out into the world again. Now, I have to wear my sunglasses when it's a bright cloudy day. If I don't, I squint worse than Mr. Magoo.

I have to say that the only benefit I've experienced so far is that I can see better out of my side windows at night. Nighttime walkers and bikers, rest easy for now, for I can see you better than I ever have. Just a reminder, though, I'm getting the darkest legal tints that money can buy as soon as I can get an appointment to do so. So don't throw away those flashy reflectors yet. You'll need them.

Friday

Click. Click, Click. Click. Click.

I used to do it with a nod of my head, but I realized that people would notice and question my odd behavior. Plus, I was always a bit too slow and the lag time left me...unsatisfied.

Click, Click. Click.

For nearly every prominent tree I pass (saplings and tightly grouped ones don't count), I'll give it one "click" between my top and bottom front tooth. If the tree is on the left, the left teeth click. The right-side front teeth click in accordance with passing passenger side trees. For most cars that pass me on the other side of the road, they will receive one click when the front bumper breaks the plane of my face--my infinite line going to either side of me--and another click when the rear bumper hits that point that I have established. If I'm feeling overly ambitious, road lines get a click, but only at the end of the line, not the beginning (though I doubt I'm very accurate at highway speeds). Other objects will also get this treatment as well, but only if the area I'm in is severely lacking in trees, other cars, or a broken lane marker.

I believe I may be crazy after all.

Quite possibly the only reason that I think I'm not entirely nuts for doing this is because if I miss a "click point," so to speak, I'm not affected by it. If I had OCD and I missed the front bumper but got the rear, I would probably have to engage in another ritual to correct my mistake and make the world right again. Maybe I'd have to tap my knee twice or turn up the stereo volume one level and then down two. Though, all of that corrective ritualism would leave me missing other important click opportunities and I'd only ever be correcting my misses. This would be a serious waste of time and addition of unneeded stress for someone with OCD, I would assume. But a miss has never been an issue for me because there is always another car or tree. Maybe I bypassed all those problems when I switched to tooth clicking from head nodding and increased my speed and accuracy, thus eliminating any real need for corrections.

Or, maybe I just get that bored when I drive the same roads all the time and I need something to keep it interesting.

That's probably the better explanation, come to think of it. If I'm not clicking, I'm usually slightly spacing out during my routine commuting route. I know the way so definitively, so back-of-my-handedly, that I'll sometimes take in the scenery and just let good 'ole Brain take the wheel. Brain will notice when my active consciousness is beginning to wander about somewhere else and will take control of my hands and feet, accurately guiding me through the morning or evening masses and get me where I need to go. If a problem occurs, it wakes me out of my stupor and I'll give my input. But mostly, it rouses me back into active reality when we've safely reached our destination. I'm not sure if I could count on two hands the amount of times I've gotten somewhere, sometimes all the way to my home or office, without having any memory of the drive. Those times that I've come to in the middle of our trip, I've almost always gripped the wheel with a sudden panic until I recognized where I was and continued on. Since I've thus far never found tattered, blood-soaked clothing or the remnants of a bicycle dangling out from the under carriage of my car, I've always thought that Brain has done a fine job in my abscence. In turn, I reward it with beer. It's a system that works.

Recently, I've noticed that since I started drinking coffee on the way into work that I haven't needed Brain to take over at all. Though, I have been clicking more, and faster. In the evening, it's a different story and all bets are off as far as my active involvement in the trek home is concerned.

So I guess what it all boils down to is that during normal commuting hours between Monday and Friday, you'll either find me to be a tooth-clicking lunatic or a zombie driver, musing about in a world of my own behind glazed over eyes while Brain does the heavy lifting. It's like having a person who does all the work in a group project and I get to slap my name on the cover when all is said and done.

But, like I said, I reward it with beer, and so far have heard no complaints.

Thursday

I never understood the handkerchief.

I'm not adverse to getting dirty or anything, but carrying around snot in my pocket all day isn't something I intend to do. Not only that, but it is used over and over again. At any given point in time, a handkerchief may be the most disgusting piece of cloth for miles around it, underwear included.

When I was much younger, I remember my father used to use a handkerchief when we'd go to church. If I had a stuffy nose and was disturbing other people around me, he'd unfurl the horrible thing--which my own eyes had watched him use multiple times that morning already--and force my face into that slimy sheet so I could add to the mess. When I'd recoil from it, I felt as if I was worse off than before, with mucus on the outside of my face as well as in. When I'd try to use my sleeve to fix the situation, he'd knock my hand down, forcing me to wear it as some sort of twisted point of pride. When we'd stand for a hymn, I'd quickly brush it all off while he towered over me, concentrating on the song and surveying the religious landscape. Perhaps he was looking for other noses to clear.

There's a man driving a brand new Audi next to me right now who has whipped out his custom monogrammed snot blanket, worthy of only the finest gold-threaded Old English lettering. He's proudly blowing and picking and wiping at his face, trying to get it all clean and presentable. Most likely off to some important meeting it seems and needs to look his best. His hand is nonchalantly tucking it back into the inside pocket of his suit jacket now. For his colleague or client's sake, I only hope his buisness cards are kept somewhere else.

What bothers me the most, I suppose, is the fact that his car costs more than I make in a year. It's got an advanced, computer-controlled, self-adjusting suspension that can read road changes in milliseconds. The car came standard with a sound system that has more speakers than my home theater amplifier has places to plug speakers in--and I have a very nice amp--and every second, every instant of his lovely and comfortable drive, is charted by a system that constantly monitors his position by decoding digital signals beaming down from outer space...

...and he carries his snot around in his pocket.

With all the advancement, all of that vivid technological evolution that surrounds him, he hasn't come to grips with the fact that tissues have advanced as well. Wonderful, lotion-infused tissues that give the experience of blowing your nose into a clean, puffy cloud instead of a sticky stale patch of pocket swamp.

Try as he may, he does not exude that refined, cultured attitude that his Audi and expensive suit are supposed to. That supple, climate-controlled cabin could be filled with the newest symphony that is caressing his ear drums from twelve different finely-tuned and precision-aimed titanium-dipped tweeter dome speakers and I will still feel more advanced as I blow my nose into a Dunkin Donuts napkin while listening to Howard Stern, knowing full well that the napkin will never touch me or anything I own ever again.

Tuesday

I woke up this morning and thought I had died in the most metaphorical way possible. The oversized clock in my room ticks with a strange, anthropomorphic melody--a TOCK tick…TOCK tick--and this ambient heartbeat just stopped at 6:15 right when I had come out of a lighter stage of sleep.

While I laid there contemplating the odd sensation I had briefly felt, I wondered, as if by some final stroke of morbid mortal curiosity, why there are never seats on bidets. It seems like there should be.

As I hit the on-ramp now, I can't help thinking about the way that felt--a strange and momentarily empty wave going through me--as the clock stopped. It's depressing to fixate on death, but on a road like this, which employs a front-end loader to remove deer and other woodland animal carcasses from the pavement every day, it becomes difficult not to. You do get numb to it though. By the time you see the sixth set of anlers or hooves hanging out of that metal mouth, you just hope that the meat is fresh enough to butcher and give to the homeless. As long as it's clean, a little highway chili might do them some good while the mornings are still cold enough to leave a layer of scrapable frost on the windshield.

As I've mentioned before, this road is dangerous. One of the most dangerous in the country, actually. I think it's been in the top ten for a while now. There are no lights, no shoulders, the lanes are thin and slightly winding, everyone drives like Mario Andretti (if he was blind, tired, and slightly intoxicated), and since it slithers through some seriously wooded areas, the animals become a problem for any driver. One time, a moose was spotted wandering down from a northern part of the state. Animal control and police had been searching for it, but couldn't track it effectively. About a week later, the evening news was reporting about the runaway animal and an anchor said something to the effect of, "God help everyone on the road if it makes it to the Merritt Parkway." The next day, he made it, and met his end when a Chevy Malibu tried to put its thousands of pounds up against the moose's hulking 1400. Neither the car or the moose came away from the incident. The driver was hospitalized with some broken bones, I think. They were very lucky.

Moose aren't common at all in this area, but deer have become highway assassins on the Merritt. It seems to me that they take pleasure in running out on the road in front of you. Like moths drawn to the eerily-hypnotic blue glow of the bug zapper, deer are thus drawn, by instinct, to the sound of spinning rubber, the blinding blaze of sealed projector headlights, and the soothing, near eardrum-caressing noise of car horns. Makes perfect sense, doesn't it?

They've become IEDs on this wooded highway; popping out with no prior notice. Their terror tactics have drivers planning contingency situations. "If you're going to hit a deer, let up on the brakes before impact so they don't roll up on the hood," is what my parents always said. They held back the "...so the coroner doesn't have to pry the horns from your face," to avoid emotionally scarring me.

I've never hit a deer and I expect my perfect record to continue through this morning drive as well. I've seen seven dead deer so far, so I think the road has claimed its daily quota. I had a dream that the road would actually coax the deer onto it so that an unsuspecting car could make the kill. Once the accident was cleared, the pavement folded up around the animal, like a venus flytrap, and consumed its meal.

Then my clock stopped and I had to start my day.

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.

Tuesday

Monday came and went like Mondays tend to come and go. I seem to just sort of ride through them on my slow-going carnival rollercoaster, catching bits and pieces of interesting things here and there, but for the most part everything just sort of blurs together and I end up back at home again.

I read something last night about lent and another slow-moving stream of commuter traffic brought me past a church just long enough that it reminded me. I was brought up a Christian so I know what lent is all about. Jesus was in the desert for forty days being tempted by Satan and we're supposed to give up chocolate; or something like that. If I worked for Cadbury's marketing group, I'd be amping up my spring campaign to keep product moving in these risky times.

I always thought that lent was really contrived. It's like Valentine's Day, made up to promote something that people should, and usually already recognize. I'm hardly the model Christian, seeing as I am now a complete non-believer, but shouldn't you just not be tempted by sin all the time, just like you should love the people that mean something to you all the time instead of only on February 14th? Do forty days of not eating chocolate really mean anything when Easter comes along and you're filling your mouth with those delicious Cadbury chocolate eggs? And really, Chocolate is what you're giving up? Get creative and give up something major, like using your sofa or third gear in your car for forty days. It looks like this guy in front of me gave up third and fourth. I'll gauge how happy Jesus is with this man's devotion by how much he doesn't crash.

I, for one, am excited for lent because I'm going to give something up that I have been carrying with me everywhere. It's been on me for months and I feel like it will be strange to rid myself of it for so long. But, I have to give it a shot. Goodbye, static electricity!

I honestly cannot remember the last time I touched something--anything--that can carry an electric charge without getting shocked. It's gotten to the point where I have to plan to touch anything metal. I haven't casually switched on a light in weeks. I'm getting goddamned PTSD from flipping light switches.

I'm generating enough electricty with my pants alone that I may be able to illuminate low voltage LED's with my fingertips. If I were alive at the height of the Egyptian empire and exhibited this much tangible electricity, they would've made me a god. Last night, I went to turn on the light in my kitchen and the spark from the screw below the switch extended out, actually illuminating the switch plate, guiding me in to flip it on. I'm waiting for the day when I just produce rare-occurring ball lightning and vaporize myself as I reach the corona of a door knob.

My pants are the main culprit, the heart of my newly acquired powerplant. They've turned my legs into Tesla coils that periodically shoot visible sparks between each other. I always knew I had power between my legs, but this is ridiculous. At a micro-level, my legs must look like those large towers that held human bodies used to power the machines in the Matrix movies, complete with giant electrical strands pulsing from the bottom towards the top. In the dark, I wouldn't be surprised if my balls were beginning to emanate an eerie glow from the amount of static charge that constantly bombards them in waves from my ankles. I've become my own electric chair, with the positive and negative contacts placed firmly on Dr. Strangelove and Oscar Guzman. I'm a hostage in my own clothes.

Spring starts in less than a month and I can't wait. Shorts, being outdoors, warmer weather, leaves back on the trees--to hell with all that noise. I'll just be glad to no longer be a walking capacitor, a ticking time bomb filled with raw energy waiting to explode off of me next time I get close enough to something it would like to take a lick of.

Believe me when I tell you that if it was socially appropriate to free myself from this electro-sticky prison for the entire winter season, I would absolutely do it. In fact, I change my mind.

I'm giving up pants for lent.