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The Metaphor of 485

 Interstate 485 is a huge loop that circles Charlotte.  It allows traffic to flow (sometimes) to nearly every side of the state.  I drive on I-485 nearly every day of my life.  


This road takes me North to where I work and play, South to where I live.  I've driven it to the East to see the Love of my Life (my son) and to the West where Helene hurt so hard earlier this year.  

If you Google I-485, you will see all kinds of pictures.  Pictures of annoying traffic back-ups, pictures of horrific traffic accidents, pictures of maps and plans for the future.  

I remember when the road was being built and connected and how excited everyone was for it.  It was going to a fabulous connector to the thorough-fares around the state by looping the center of it all: the major city of Charlotte.  

In the beginning, it was wonderful!  It DID help with congestion.  It DID cut down travel time and traffic.  It DID seem to be the solution to all the problems of Piedmont gridlock.

Until it wasn't.

Now you hear more about the problems than the solutions of 485.  But I'm not a traffic expert or city planner.  I'm just a driver.  And a person who spends a lot of time on a road that gives me a lot of time to think.

485 has a lot of great drivers.  And a lot of shitty drivers.  It is full of selfish people who are only thinking of themselves and their own needs.  It is full of distracted people who aren't keeping their eyes on the road.  It is full of risk-takers who don't care if they put you at risk too.  

I have been all these people.

But for as much as I hate this interstate at times, I still manage to have some love for it.  My favorite time to be on the 485 loop is in the morning when it's still dark and I'm heading to work.  When I drive up over the high ramp to head to North Charlotte, I can look over toward the west and see the lights of traffic moving in every direction.  Over-hurried ambitious office workers going in early.  Trucks hauling commodities to every side of the state.  Construction trucks (lots of them) running technicians and supplies to jobs.  Huge hauling trucks pulling huge heavy highway equipment like dozers and excavators.  

I love all those lights.  They are progress.  They are momentum.  The many teeny tiny ants of the world making the world move.  If you sleep in, you'll miss it, but these are the people that create our world.  I love those people.  

I have driven on this road in every direction.  I have been looking straight ahead with utter concentration on this road.  I have cried on this road.  I have sang along with Mary J. Blige and Fred Durst on this road.  I have had many hands-free conversations on this road.  I have sat and huffed and puffed on this road.  I have seen many (too many) sites of accidents on this road.  

Somehow, I have always managed to drive away safely.  Away safely from the selfishness.  From the hurriedness.  From the risk-takers.  Somehow I've always gotten to where I've wanted to go.  

As another year closes of driving on this treacherous but still necessary highway, I'm grateful for where it takes me.  But always grateful that it takes me home.  Always.  
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