We've been condemned to be a one-car household for a while, since Elrin's car is in the shop after a horrid encounter with a rather sizable truck tire (in the middle of the night, on a highway). As a result, I get to drive him to work. It's not a bad drive (30 minutes one way), and takes us across a veritably stunning patch of land.
It is rural Appalachia, and the road weaves around the forested slopes, which are eaten by the fog in the early morning hours. Invasive kudzu covers some of these slopes, turning trees into green giants, stooping and strange. You catch these out of the corner of the eye and can swear that they move.
The car, a 4-cyllinder, 12-year old Honda, is as reliable as ever. I suppose it will begin to fail on me one day, just as old pets fail out eventually (most recent case- one of the folks' cats, from cancer of the jaw, of all things), but for now, the Honda can still take on the mountain slopes and emerge victorious. After 8 years of driving it, it's hard to adjust to being in anything else.
Inbetween thoughts of car mortality, and plans for the day, and quiet underlying admiration for the scenery, I think I'm beginning to figure out life. It's a lot more simple than "Do what you want to do, and be nice to other people", though that factors into it, too. The meaning of life is closer to "Be, without regret". We spend such an awful lot of time worrying about things that are really of little to no account. What others think of us. How to get ahead. How to afford that smart phone. As long as you've got food and a roof over your head, why should the rest matter?
There are interesting people out there, and good books available for nigh-free (cost of getting to the library, anyway), and good arts. There are also addictive video games. The world is not a bad place, and there isn't really much more you could give it, than your appreciation. And, maybe, a sort of gratitude better reserved for those that give us birth.
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