Night Time Traffic

Last night, I couldn’t sleep. I lay in the bed for hours listening to AM talk radio softly playing from my bedside alarm clock. Oddly, most of the commercials didn’t bother me as they normally do. They were advertising products or money making schemes that didn’t apply to me; things such as herbal hair growth products and weird “get rich quick” money making schemes. They seemed to play the same commercials over and over and it was comforting in a certain sense.

One commercial was especially comforting. The voice was that of an older middle aged man. He would start every commercial by saying, “How in the world are you anyway?” He would then go into this spiel about how you could make $5000 dollars a month in your own home by following his “three step plan.” His voice was melodic and soothing. I looked forward to those frequent commercials by him even though I knew his message was full of shit. If you could make $5000 dollars a month from your own home in your pajamas then everybody would be doing it.

One show that caught my interest was called Point of View. It was a Christian call-in program that went on and on about how subversive and manipulating the same sex marriage movement has been and how wrong it is. It reminded me of same type of vitriol and hatred that was spouted in the south during the end of segregation. I genuinely felt sorry for those narrow minded people, but listened with a certain fascination that people could still think such a way in this day and age.

Finally, I got up out of the bed and walked outside to smoke. I sat upon a wrought iron chair sitting around a matching table in my backyard that Charlie had brought over a few weeks ago. I lit up a cigarette and listened to the night time sounds. I could hear the interstate many miles away on that cool night. The sound of the big rigs rolling down that highway was most prevalent. Even at four in the morning commerce must go on in today’s economy. It brought back flashbacks from my long haul truck driving days. I reminisced on how hard a job it was and how glad I was no longer amongst those drivers toiling the lonesome roads at this time of hour.

I finally finished my cigarette and climbed back into bed. Sleep overcame me.