Slow Lane Eulogy

The view from the rear driver’s side window remained stationary. It would change, eventually. The traffic back from the Poconos was insane, and this was the fastest route according to the GPS. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it wasn’t also over eighty degrees out, the cell service was better than spotty, and the radio was working properly. Stuck on an upstate New York backroad in traffic with just radio static is awful, I knew I should have downloaded some podcasts or eBooks. Now all I have is my view of nature for entertainment.

              Right on time the scenery shifted about 30 feet. It would remain at the same view of the forest for another thirty seconds then shift forward like clockwork. I rolled my head forward to get a sneak preview of what was coming up and saw something on the side of the road.

              I leaned forward pointed through the front seats, “Hey Mom, what’s that?”

              “What is what dear?” She turned to look at me, no need to keep full attention on the road at this speed.

              “That white thing on the side of the road up ahead,” I nodded indicating where I was looking.

              “Oh that. That must be a memorial. Families usually put up something like that on the side of the road where a family member or close friend was killed in a traffic accident.”

              “That’s so sad. It looks like it’s been there for a while.” The monument was a white cross, or at least it used to be white, it took on a green tint over the time it was here. It was tilted and the cross bar was barely holding on. Clumps of long dried out and dead flowers littered the base and what might have once been a stuffed animal was now just a fuzzy carcass lying face down about a foot from the cross. I took out my phone and did some searching for car accidents in this area. After just a short search, that took a bit longer thanks to the crappy service, I found the incident that this one must be for. “Looks like this is for a girl named Molly that was killed in an accident just over a year ago. Her car was hit by a drunk driver as they were heading back from vacation. Oh, she was only 13.”

              Mom shook her head and sighed, “So young, that’s just too bad.”

              “It’s only been a year, why hasn’t anyone kept it up. Judging from how it is it looks like they put it up and just forgot about it,” this was making me upset, where was her family? Friends? Anyone to keep this monument in shape.  

              “Well people get busy, or maybe there is no one to keep it up. It also happened in sort of the middle of nowhere.” Mom shrugged.

              “Oh, sorry her death was so inconvenient for everyone. But I guess I wouldn’t have even noticed it if we weren’t stuck in slow traffic,” the scenery made another small jump ahead, slightly closer to the monument.

              “That’s the issue with life sometimes. Life just goes too fast, and no one slows down to remember the things that are gone.”  

              I took a beep breath and let it out slowly. Mom was right, things do just go too fast sometimes. You need to take advantage of the slower times and reflect. I sat up suddenly, struck by inspiration by my thought. I unbuckled my seat belt, “Mom, be right back.”

              “Where are you going?” but I already had the door open and was out of the car heading toward the monument. I knelt by it and started clearing the weeds and dead flowers from it. I looked around and saw some dandelions nearby, not perfect but better than nothing. As I pulled them up and placed them at the base of the cross the line of cars moved forward again.

              “Want me to pull over and wait for you to finish?” Mom called.

              “No, you’re barely moving anyways.”

              I reset the cross and straightened it out, piling some loose dirt at the base for stability. A few hair ties I happened to have in my pocket secured the cross bar back on and made it relatively straight. I didn’t have anything to try and clean off the cross, so it had to remain stained green.

              Traffic moved ahead again, bringing our car at the same point that I’m at.

              “Even at this slower pace I guess I don’t have a lot of time here. I’m sorry about what happened to you, not just the accident but what came after as well. I wish I could do a better job cleaning this up and you probably have an actual grave that some people visit but the point of this cross was to remind others that things happen and that are lost here with the lack of upkeep and everyone passing by so quickly. And to be honest, I’ll probably forget about this when my life gets busy. But I hope that when I take a moment to stop and reflect, I’ll remember this day and be thankful for what I have.”

              By now our car was two more lengths down the road. “C’mon honey, time to go!”

              “Bye Molly,” I got up and ran down on the car and got in.

              “Looks like the bottle neck is almost cleared up.” Mom nodded toward what was causing the traffic. Looking out the window I saw flashing lights and a tow truck starting to pull away. A car accident, no ambulance can be seen and the cars just had dented bumpers, so it looks like it wasn’t fatal. Luckily there won’t be another memorial joining Mollys’. Once we passed the scene of the accident we immediately accelerated and started flying down the road.

              “That was a nice gesture you did back there, I’m sure she would appreciate it.” Mom smiled at me.

              “It was the least I could do. I guess I just got upset that people could let something like that go into disrepair. Maybe next time there is some traffic on that road someone will do the same.”  The scenery was flying by quickly now, no more forest just flat blank highway now. The radio static lessoned and “Take It Easy” by Jackson Brown came on the classics station. “Hey, turn this up.”