I pulled out of our subdivision onto the main road and found I needed to make some adjustments. Someone had driven my truck and had adjusted the seats and radio to their liking and away from mine. So as I drove I fiddled with the radio stations, adjusted my seat, and attempted to complete the turn onto the road – all at the same time. While I didn’t do too bad I did drift into the median and suddenly heard my tires “brumping” over the reflectors stuck in the asphalt. After a series of “brump, brump, brump, brump, brump…” my son finally looked over at me and said, “What? Are you driving by Braille?”
“Driving by Braille.” What an interesting concept. We all do it though don’t we? Just about all the expressways now have washboards on each side of the road so that you will not just see but FEEL yourself going off the road. Many other major roads have them as well. In Las Vegas every main road has button reflectors designating the lanes, medians and turning lanes and if you drive over them – you FEEL it. All it takes is a little day-dreaming on my part while driving and suddenly, “BRUMP, BRUMP, BRUMP, BRUMP” and I am shocked back into the strait and narrow road.
I wish life had better washboard shoulders so we could feel ourselves going off the road a little sooner. There are warning signs all over about leaving the strait and narrow, and what will happen if we run off the road but I just wish they were a better mechanism. Maybe I am just lazy and starting to daydream in my life too much. I find that when I recognize being off the road it is too late to turn back and I am heading for a crackup in the ditch somewhere. Maybe I just missed the signs again, or maybe I have just gotten too used to the “brump, brump, brump, brump” that I ignore the feeling of impending danger. I know that if I would get out of my day-dream and look around I would see many areas in my life where I was driving by Braille and ignoring it the warning signs.
How about you? Are you hearing the “brump, brump, brump, brump” of the side of the road warning you? Are you ignoring it, used to it, or too far in the ditch to hear it? Let’s wake up and get back into the middle of the road.