Damn, This Traffic Jam

Damn, this traffic jam

How I hate to be late

It Hurts my motor to go so slow

Damn, this traffic jam

Time I get home my supper'll be cold

Damn, this traffic jam

Capella song by James Taylor runs through my head every night at quitting time when I am stuck in this traffic jam to get on the highway home.  I should’ve written that letter to the mayor letting him know that an fifty percent increase in population means we have to widen the roads to accommodate it.  Nothing ever gets done and we sit in this traffic wondering how long it will take us to get home. 

That Ford pickup in front of me could use a new muffler as is it here breathing in his exhaust.  I would love to honk and say something, but that would not be civil of me.  I don't know him.  He may have a gun.   

There are so many things that are so uncertain in this world.

So many things…

Up yours!

I got nowhere to go, you moron.  We are both stuck in this damn traffic Jam.

I started smoking in my first traffic jam.

Turn on the radio.

Smoking Oldies. Great…

Such a waste of time.

There is nothing to do just sitting here.

Don't you dare cut me off.

My mind fills with such awful thoughts when I'm sitting in traffic.  I get edgy and agitated.  By the time I get home, I'm in such a foul mood.  Just once I'd like to come home in a good mood, but when I have to deal with idiots at the office and then I have to deal with more of them out here on this highway entrance.  It just doesn't seem fair.

Speaking of not fair, I'll bet Gil Donohue gets that promotion I've been gunning for.  I have seniority.  I've been there longer.  Doesn't loyalty mean anything anymore?  Brown-noser.  Mr. Emmett thinks he is the golden child.

Come on, move ahead.  I don't want to be sitting here any longer than I have to!

And the Dorsey Account?  That was me.  All me.  Two million dollar account in my back pocket and all I get is an "Atta-boy?"  "No way to go, Mitchell!  No big pat on the back.  Nothing.

I'm on my horn because you don't know what a green light is!

This whole thing sucks, If you ask me.  Sarah even told me Mr. Emmett is looking at a club membership for Donohue.  She should know, she's his secretary.

You know Reese has been sending me emails about joining their financial team.  I just might do it, but their rating is a full point behind ours.  It would be like leaving the warm water to jump into a shark tank.  I'm not sure that would be a smart move.

Can't believe that guy just cut me off.  This is one of the worst traffic jams I've seen in a long time.  Look at that jerk smile. I have half a mind to slap him.

Just like I want to slap Donohue.  slap that smug grin right off his fat little face.

My wife Jenny wants to start my daughter Nellie on birth control.  Nellie is only fourteen.  Or is she fifteen now?  Doesn't matter, my little girl has no business being on birth control, but Jenny says it's for her own.  The Hell it is!

Hey buddy, is this your first day with your brand new license?  I've got a buck, buy yourself a clue!  Same to you, Idiot.

You know, I used to be a good person. But over time we change into these monsters we have no intention of becoming. 

My dad was pretty rough on me and I swore that I'd never be like that to my own kids and yet here I am sitting in this traffic jam thinking about the scrappy things I say to my son, Rodney without meaning to.  I never apologize either, because that is the way the world Is.  There must be over a hundred vehicles vying for two lanes of highway and nobody has any regard for anybody else but themselves.

When did we become so self-centered? 

Ah, Shove it where the sun don't shine, you pig!  Is that your IQ or your sperm count?

Rodney and I got into a few days ago.

Straight A student.  Wants to go to trade school and be a blue collar working stiff.  What is up with that?  Ain't the world hard enough without throwing your whole future in the pit. 

Then his younger brother, Brad wants to be transgender.  Transgender?  What is this all about?  God gives you certain stuff either male or female.  You don't get to choose.  God gave you the stuff for a reason, not so you can say, "Hey God, you got it wrong.  I was meant to be a girl."

This world is going to Hell In a handbasket.

Good thing my old man isn't around to see this.  He'd have a fit.  He'd set these freaks straight. He told me how him and his buddies would go gay-bashing.  Bust up them queers good and proper.  Wonder what he'd make of Brad?  He died before Brad turned six.  He used to smoke like a chimney and drink at Pesto's. our neighborhood bar.  Sometimes mom would send me there to get him.  He'd be stumbling and fumbling all the way home.  Four blocks, when this town was still rural and everyone knew everybody else. I was there to help him, but he was so much bigger than me and the sidewalk was so uneven. 

Dad went to Korea in 1951.  He never talked much about it, but he used to wake up screaming with the cold sweats.  One time we were fooling around, wrestling like boys do, but then he grabbed me and before I could move, he had his hand inches from my throat, ready to strike, but when I looked into his eyes and I could see he was ready to kill me.  I wasn't his son anymore.  It took him a few moments to realize what he was about to and he went back to normal.  I have never been so scared of him in my life.

Life was simpler back then.  Things were black and white. There were no gray areas.

Watch out Bozo!

I look in the rearview mirror.  

So I almost had a heart attack

Looking in my rear view mirror

I saw myself the next car back

Looking in the rear view mirror

About to have a heart attack, I said

Damn, this traffic jam



The real horror I see in the reflection is the familiar face, the rounded eyebrows as if some cartoonist painted them on in haste, the colorless gray eyes with the white streaked with red lines that appear as some roadmap to nowhere, the nose that sags just a bit off to the right and the stiff straight line that runs due north of my chin with the invisible lips pressed so tightly together.  

When I take a close look, I see his face, because genetics likes to play cruel games.  Genetics wants to replicate the things we most disdain in the previous generation like that look in his eyes with a hint of “I tolja so. You thought you were so smart.  You thought you had all the answers, but you didn’t have a clue, now dija.” All of this said without words.  All of this said with just a look in his eyes.  I have inherited this from him, I can see it reflected clearly in my mirror. 

I hang my head.

“You thought you were better than me, but how did that work out for you?”

His laugh echoes in my head. 

Go ahead, make fun of me all you want.  Seems like that’s what gave you the most pleasure in life.

“You are wrong, Travis Mitchell, what gave me the most pleasure was knowing no matter how hard you pushed that rock, Sissyphyss, it would always roll back down again.  You are so predictable.”

Someone honks.  They are honking at me since I am sitting here unable to move.

“I was just like you when I was young.” His words have a jagged edge that cuts me right to my soul. 

I was nothing like you.

“The heck you weren’t. It’s just like looking in a mirror, kid.  Like looking in a mirror.” The laugh fades, but in my frustration I almost collide with a van.  It was my fault, but somehow I avoided collision.  I wave an apology at the driver of the van who does not look pleased even though I managed to miss his van.

These traffic jams always bring out the worst in me.  Between the current dilemmas and the ancient ones from my past, I feel as if I am rolling down a hill with broken shards of glass.

Jenny and I are going through a rough patch. It’s what happens when you ignore your significant other.  

She saw one of the emails I got from Sophia.

Ah Sophia Jennings with all of the curves in all the right places and a smile like a siren luring me to the jagged rocks of the shore.

I was warned by all my coworkers to steer clear, but the will is weak and the temptation strong.

We went out to lunch one time, that was all, but the guilt from that one time feels like an anchor.

The email was just a joke, but that’s not what Jenny read.

I was careless leaving my laptop open so she could press one key and see the entire list of all my correspondences.  I had talked about Sophia once and so she clicked on the email.  Innocent flirtation, but innocent or not, what resulted was an argument that has put a crack in our fifteen year marriage.

Her father has never liked me.  Never called me son.  Never asked how business is going.  He makes me feel like I live on an island.  

Finally I am on the highway, but that is not any real victory since top speed is no more than twenty miles per hour. At this rate, I will make it home before sundown. I am left to wonder if all those other drivers have similar concerns and problems.  Maybe this isn’t a traffic jam at all, but a meeting of all the disenfranchised who thought they were working their way up the ladder, rung by rung, only to find out there is no end to it all.  Only to find out each time you move up, so does the prize. I do envy those who are happy where they are at.  Content to occupy the middle cubical where no one has a clue who they are. 

We were taught to reach for the brass ring.  There is only one, but persistence will win the day. The only thing that persistence does is lead me to this traffic jam each and every night.  Look at all of these guys reaching for the brass ring and coming up empty handed just like me.  

Sophia Jennings has spent over ten years in the secretarial pool and only a few close associates even know her name.  And she’s not the only one.  Look at them all, scrambling for position so they can get home a few minutes early, have dinner before falling asleep in front of the television.  When the alarm goes off, they have to start all over again.  

People wonder why I am always such a grouch.

I let things get to me that won’t be remembered come tomorrow.

Why is the outcome always such a disappointment?

Why do the things I do always seem so futile?

Like that sandcastle Rodney and I built when we went to the ocean a while ago.  High tide came in and all our hard work was washed away.  A fitting metaphor if ever there was one, eh?

James Taylor knew what he was talking about when he sang this song back in 1977 when he was still a young man.  It holds a simple truth that is still relevant today, I think.  

Singing the song to myself, I suddenly realize there are so many things I could do to avoid these traffic jams.

I could tell Rodney I love him and understand what he’s going through.

I could tell Sarah I love her and will always support her in whatever she does.

I could tell my wife Jenny how much she means to me and take her out for a night on the town.  

I could tell Brad that I may not understand his declaration of who he is, but he will always be loved by me.

So many changes I could make, but I know that while I am thinking about them now, by the time I get home they will vanish like ghosts and I will continue to deal with the traffic jams I encounter each day.  It’s a shame when you start to think about it.