Drive Time

Last week, I was driving home late from work one evening. The big muckety mucks were up from the corporate office, and we had gone out for a late, decadent dinner at one of the local dining facilities. The food and wine continued over a 3 hour, non-stop onslaught and I was already beginning to feel the pain from my over-indulgence.

Home is 40 miles away from work, and at 10:30 at night, with a belly full of food and alcohol, it was going to be a chore not to pull over and go to sleep. Why is it on the weekends we can drink and eat until the wee hours of the morning, but during the work week anything past 10PM feels like the crack of dawn is just around the corner?

The vast majority of my commute is along the NYS thruway, a four lane highway that stretches the length of NYS. They have just finished resurfacing a good portion of the Thruway, and it’s so smooth right now that it’s like driving on glass. No bumps, no pot holes or that thumpity thump of expansion joints that is so common on concrete highways. At night it’s this jet black river, without any lights, and just the yellow lines on the side to keep you from driving off the side into neverland.

The sky had some high, wispy clouds and two, parallel contrails that pierced the full moon, almost as if the moon was riding along on a pair of ethereal rail road tracks. Now, normally, I don’t recommend driving home at night, after you’ve had a few drinks, and taking your eyes off the road to stare up at the stars, but if you did, on this night, when you looked away from the moon’s glare, there were stars aplenty up in the firmament to reward you for your efforts. Again, don’t try this at home, or at least when I’m coming the other way on the road.

My Ipod served up for my listening pleasure Rush’s Red Barchetta, which just happens to be one of my favorite road songs. I turned up the volume, pushed my four cylinders for all they were worth, and raced home to my family. For a brief moment in time, it was heaven.