Set a new destination, and Go! I drove on auto-pilot, following the GPS for miles before I realized I had no idea where I was anymore. I had a vague recollection of what the destination was, but I couldn’t remember it clearly. I was alone, watching the highway but not seeing anything. I had entered a dream state, hypnotized by the white noise of the engine, the rain and wind hitting the hood and the defrost blowing against the windshield. I was aware of the shoulder of the road in the periphery, flowing as if it were a gray stream of water, a brook that couldn’t stop, forced by time and nature to keep moving. For a moment I wasn’t sure if my foot was on the gas pedal or if the road itself was pushing me forward. I blinked hard to make sure I hadn’t dozed off, to make sure I was still awake.
I didn’t remember starting the car, pulling out onto the street or going up the entry ramp to the highway. I didn’t even remember how long I had been driving, minutes or hours? Suddenly the questions left my mind when I heard an assertive but feminine voice. She gave me directions to stay to the left, but the highway was already forking and I had stayed to the right. It was too late to listen to her and her lagging instructions. “Recalculating. . .”
I heard the authoritative, feminine voice again – but it wasn’t the GPS this time, it was my mothers - “You move at warp speed, always going so fast through life.”
Her voice brought a sign into focus. White letters on green, her favorite color: roadside rest, .5 miles. Literally a sign, an instruction from my mother that for once I gave in to without thinking. I eased my right foot off of the gas, decelerated and pulled off the road into the rest area where I parked. I turned off the ignition, leaned back on the headrest and closed my eyes. I paused and my senses returned. I heard the rain hit the roof and the windshield, slower now that I was still, and I thought I could hear each drop distinctly. They were falling in groups of three – drop, drop, drop - as if each was thanking me for slowing down, stopping here and listening, listening, listening…
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