Traffic

Traffic (mainly vehicles on roadways) is sometimes good, sometime frustrating, and always a topic of conversation; usually negative. It occurs to me that traffic negativity oozes from selfishness; My trip is delayed. My time is wasted; My day is disturbed. My. My. My. Of course other kinds of traffic have similar issues; airlines, trains, etc. In 1969 the Rolling Stones came out with the hit song, You can’t always get what you want. by songwriters, Keith Richards and Mick Jagger.

You can’t always get what you want
You can’t always get what you want
But if you try sometime you’ll find
You get what you need…

I like the final words of that verse! “…sometime you’ll you get what you need!“ (emphasis mine). I often notice people in traffic, “getting what they need:” Not always, but as the song says—sometime—and often enough to give me hope for humanity. I live very close to an access into a busy–two lane—traffic corridor. Making a turn into it—especially a left turn—is quite difficult. That’s when I see bright rays of joy; a driver is signaling to make a left turn into traffic—and another driver pauses, signals “come on in,” and each usually sends a polite thanks, Once in a while, when both lanes are heavy, drivers from both directions will pause and open the way.

It is true that too many drivers act as if they own the roadway. But if you look, you will find polite, friendly drivers every day. I find in this matter of traffic, a lesson of kindness. It is a matter of perspective. During the heaviest hits of COVID-19, a frequently quoted phrase emerged—“We are all in this together.” I guess it is traffic that most often pumps up our sense of urgency.

I think of the late Art Linkletter (host of “Kids Say The Darnedest Things”); I read that while talking to kids, he asked what they would do if while in an airplane it lost an engine. One little boy said, “I would jump out the window….” The audience burst into laughter. But Linkletter was paying attention. He saw the little boy’s reaction to their laughter; tears began welling up in his eyes. Linkletter asked “Why would you go out the window?” The little boy said, “I was going out to get help!” Despite the time crunch of the TV program, or the the pressure go pursue laughter, the life blood of the program, Linkletter paused and listened. It made all the difference that day. He validated the kid’s earnest answer.

There is a wonderfully funny story in the Gospel of Luke abut a man stuck in traffic—well, it was foot traffic. True to his penchant for human interest the writer of the Gospel gives two sides of that traffic scenario. First there is the frustration for the little guy blocked by the heavy crowd (read “traffic”); the next is that of Jesus, who, although under heavy demands and great needs of the crowd, took the time to pause, look, listen, and get involved—making a life-changing difference for that little man.

Life gets crowded—sometimes more than others. It is easy to get entangled in life’s traffic; it Then it becomes easy to miss the more savory moments of life; Most of those turn out to be simply snapshots—here a moment and then a memory. Those moments, like cells of the body, make up the salve of life—-salve, by the way, is the root word of salvation.

©Copyright Willis H. Moore 2023