1 post tagged “concrete”

On any paved surface used frequently for vehicle travel are grooves, slight indentations breaking the thoughtfully constructed arch of the road, where the weight of daily activity is impressed. I slip along the far left side of the street, too light to leave my own impression.
It’s no secret. The brain likes repetitive behavior. It wrinkles up in excitement leaving huge canyons which direct the flow of behavior. Even the motivations that lead my wife to break her commitment were the spark of childhood memories and a complete reliving of her late teens. In the last months of our marriage, as she swung in a playground swing, she was so lost in reminiscing that she was only vaguely aware of me and children, trap in an idealized past, stuck in the ruts of good memories and childhood lovers now miraged by a 31 year old department supervisor/death metal drummer.
But just as routine can be the ruin, it can also be salvation out of trying times. As I transverse the complex intersections, I catch myself lost in thought, using only lower functions of the brain to negotiate the traffic and am made slightly nervous by the realization, but the sense of satisfaction derive from the morning ride now reduced to subconscious activity is so complete, that I feel an overwhelming sense of well being, the triggers for all the insecurity of the last three months washed away by endorphins. It is a daily cleansing so satisfying that even the sharp pain emanating from my right foot, possibly broke from the strain of running on concrete bare foot at a water park, isn’t enough to keep me from the ritual.
Just as much as the grooves in the road are caused by the barrage of tires, they seem to hold those wheels on course. Such is the way with wrinkles. This is healthy behavior that transforms the ruin of my life into an optimistic future, and even though the weight of my vehicle leaves no visible impression on the concrete I travel, there is a rut there, keeping my course fixed.