This past weekend I enjoyed working for the Army Corp of Engineers in far southern Illinois, almost 600 miles from my home. My work provides me with the opportunity to be a road warrior from time to time and these long trips are often taken on the roads I usually loath: Interstates. I understand the importance of them. Many years ago my lovely wife and I were run off the road on the Interstate by another car as they day-dreamed-drove. It was by excellent driving skills of my wife and a large degree of luck that I am here to write about it. As the years have gone by, I have realized it’s an easy thing to do on the Interstate. The benefit of the Interstate is speed. The negative of the Interstate is monotony, with a drive broken up only by the occasional billboard or promised rest area sign, or the dreaded gasoline stop you are forced to make as you try desperately to get from point A to B in the allotted Mapquest calculation.
This past weekend I saw a firetruck attempting to merge from one Interstate to another only to be run off the road by a large over-the-road truck. I had to slam on my breaks to avoid collision as the large truck over-corrected into my lane. The monotony must be even worse for someone in the saddle for many more hours than I, perhaps so used to the route that they no longer pay any attention at all. When I passed the men in the firetruck as they merged back onto the roadway, they looked perplexed but calmer than I ever would have been.
Podcasts have become an essential part of my travels and have given me the ability to learn facts, laugh and even cry as I listen to well written and shared stories. They remind me of the importance of story, how we all connect to them, not on the facts themselves, but how those facts affect us. They have reminded me of the importance of charity and hope and love. These long drives have given me a chance to contemplate and challenge my thoughts, to test ideas and resolve them in my mind. They have given me the chance to observe a moment and then reflect on it for hours as I drive.
Such a thing happened in a small town in Illinois. It was the hour of “blue highways”, those small town roads on maps that used to be the only route. These are the ones that traverse the real fabric of America, the well kept small towns where Sunday church bells call the locals out from their family breakfast. These are the roads that take you past the large brick courthouse on the main square declaring itself the county seat, the benches freshly painted with flowers planted nearby. Awnings with the name of the proprietor proudly imprinted on the front, with hand written signs in the windows. These are not images from a bygone era in Norman Rockwell paintings. They are alive and real and honest and today. These are towns unencumbered by modern vanity of fancy cars and custom license plates. These are places where the dirt under your fingernails is the measure of your importance – the dirty, the better.
It was only after I passed the sign that I smiled and wished I would have stopped. Unfortunately, my real driving skills are limited to small cars, and this rig I drive to events with truck and trailer measures over 45 feet. It is not, or should I say, I am not, nimble with threading it into tight situations. As I passed the sign, all I could do was log it into memory to share with you.
Population 951. The sign would not seem important other that the fact that the “1” was hand painted in fresh white paint over the zero. Large enough to make sure it replaced the entire width and height of the “0”. At first I thought it was grafitti, but soon determined it was a declaration from proud parents who had thoughtfully made sure the entire world knew that their little town had added a new, very important resident.
Normal Rockwell would have been proud.
The Mirror has two faces 
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