The Upside of Traffic

On Saturday afternoon I was headed for my sister's house along with everybody and their brother (well, the rest of the expressway drivers didn't actually make it to the door, so maybe they were going somewhere nearby). I am pretty tolerant of traffic after the immense amount of time I spent in my car over the past couple of years, usually biding my time singing along with the radio or chatting on the phone. But on this day I saw the opportunity for about an hour of fairly uninterrupted time to focus on myself and do battle with the helplessness that has been plaguing me of late. In any circumstance in life the only thing you have control over is how it makes you feel. I am not of the school that interprets this truth by closing their eyes and humming whenever anything unpleasant happens. I like to feel good and rotten for a while, but I'd had enough. I sat in the relative silence of my couch-on-wheels and had a little self therapy. I tried to name the feelings that were keeping me down and each time I identified one I concentrated on how it would feel not to feel that way. As soon as I was rid of powerless, excluded came to the front of the line, followed soon after by fat (how did fat become a feeling and why is it connected to every other bad feeling?). By the time I got the South Street I didn't care that I'm the only single person I know, nor was I consumed by strategies for desperately cornering the 3 or 4 single men that must exist somewhere on earth. It was a beautiful evening and I was going to see some of my favorite people. And the feeling has persisted. I've had a glorious day doing pleasant errands at a leisurely pace. And I'm not saying it means anything, but I ran into Mr. Handsome twice today, and it just makes me smile 'cause he's so darn pretty!