Road Signs

He reached up, pulled the cars’ visor down and sneezed. The visor was by now sun-baked, dried out plastic held together only by dust. He drove toward the ocean. He needed a break. Life was coming at him like falling Dominos. Everything cost money they didn’t have. The marriage was strained; what with the two toddlers. Not to mention that he’d broken his ankle in the accident on the loading dock.

The car bounced along making noises every time a shock engaged or a joint was put under stress. It too was held together by dust and perhaps, like the universe, God’s voice kept it from blowing apart.

It was a full day’s drive out to the coast. He wasn’t even sure why he was driving there. He’d thrown a mental dart at an imagined dart board and made the decision to go. The thought occurred to him that he could just keep driving. Then where would he end up---a crippled man in a beat up car? Not surprising to find himself thinking of escape. Maybe he could keep driving onto Loreto; Mexican waters, whale watching and no one watching over your shoulder.

So he drove squinting into the setting sun. Road signs for the canyons meant he was almost there. The car careened around the turns and gravity kept it on the road. Now and then running water off to the side of the road, a small waterfall, not what he expected but a pleasant surprise.

The main road along the coast more freeway than highway. He pulled into a lonely parking lot, got his jacket and crutches from the trunk and went out onto the sand. Decided that crutches and sand weren’t a good mix---was going to just have to hobble. Found a rock still warm from the sun and crawled up onto it. Stared out at the ocean. Such an immense body of water. The waves pounding, pounding, pounding onto the shore.

There was something about the vastness and the power that spoke to him. So much beauty and he was but a part of it. So much power under constraint. The beauty and the power; perhaps a provident hand holding it together. Not an answer but a spark of hope. Thinking on that he decides to spend some more hours staring and meditating. Then to try to find a hotel for the night and back home tomorrow. Not with answers—but a spark of hope which is what I guess he was looking for all along.