Forward

Compared to most commutes, mine is pastoral. Or rather bucolic. Maybe relaxing best describes the experience. I drive on a winding road along a grand river that I learned to spell as child by saying M-I-ss-I-ss-I-pp-I a thousand times over. Few drivers take this route perhaps because the speed limit is twenty-five miles an hour. Or maybe they envy those jogging on the pedestrian trail or rowing on the water in long canoes. On occasion a paddle boat cruises with passengers or a barge moves containers of gravel up or down the river. One spot stands out from the others where a river side park stores twisted steel beams recovered from a bridge collapse. "It makes me think of a graveyard," says a friend riding with me one day. The beams are markers, but for me they evoke a random and unplanned public art. Often people stop and take pictures while looking through a chain-link fence posted "state law, no trespassing." Nature in the form of thick weeds grows up and around the beams, now rusted from exposure. This morning several men wearing hard hats stand inside the fenced area. My head turns twice to see what they're doing. I consider pulling over to talk to them when a distraction passes by on roller skis and reminds me to move on.