While Sitting in Traffic on a Tuesday Evening

"While Sitting in Traffic on a Tuesday Evening”

A work of creative nonfiction.

By

K. R. King

What does it take to truly cope with every little Curveball,

Every arduous moment?

Every morning, we wake up

And wonder why life can't be “the dream”

You know,

That dream that great poets

Have been writing about for centuries,

And why can't we have more than what we have?

It's insanity, this rat race

Always wanting more

Always noticing what is wrong

Always looking for the trouble

One thing I have learned is

That if a person goes looking for trouble,

They will find it

And while everything innocent certainly

Does come to trial in this lifetime

I think there is merit in how a person pulls through

It takes a great strength to say

That each morning is a new opportunity

To seize the day, carpe diem, and all that optimistic bullshit

Seize the day

Or so they say

But what is meant is

“Grind away!”

Our teachers and parents and guidance counselors and coaches

And pastors and inspirational motivators on the air making fifty dollars on every CD they can get us to buy because we are so depressed and desperate

That they can solve all of our problems in just eight hours on a four disc set-

Yes, all that optimistic bullshit that anyone from a recovering heroine addict to a reformed rapist, or a professor emeritus with twelve masters degrees and six doctorates, or a doctor with a magical pen and paper to prescribe away the pain can feed into our South Parked, Survivored, American Idoled minds to lull us into a false sense of security-

What that doctor doesn't know is that some people can't live without pain

Does that even make sense?

Or the latest self-motivation book at the nearest Barnes & Noble,

Like the one three-quarters of a mile from my house-

Yes, each morning is a new opportunity

To do one's best, one's absolute best

And it's nice to, just for once, hear someone appreciate

The good times when the times are good

And want some peace

It's not that I'm not hopeful

But what drives me to lunacy isn't

The depressing past that's permanently burrowed

Somewhere in the back of my mind,

Or the other foolishness, scary as it may be, that is happening now,

Or the fear of not knowing what will happen tomorrow

It's things like turning on the big screen

And watching society tear itself apart from the inside out on national television

Always look for someone to blame,

The Jew, the dyke or the fag, the feminist, the whoever it may be

Please don't point your self-righteous, bigoted sausage fingers at me

I'm not to blame for the downfall of civilization

Downfall implies that there was once a high point from which to fall

City on a hill, city on a mound,

City on an acid trip if you ask me

It's all the same

So we wake up, day after day

Worrying about the congestion on the 15 or the 91 or the 605

Or the 210 or the 101 or wherever millions of people flock together

With a sense of mad unity while they desperately floor it to get

To wherever they need to get to

It would be nice to see so many breathing bodies together without that madness

Why can't we just throw one huge tailgating party

And live for a day?

Wondering how we managed to pay the bills last month

And how we will manage to pull it off again this month

In fact, wondering how we will manage to get through the next year

And hoping that life will throw us a bone sometime between the 1st and the 15th

When the next car repayment note is due

All we can do is all we can do

Nothing more, nothing left

So turn off the television, crank up the volume on your life

And do all you can do

Because life is the greatest improvisation of all

Just don't let it go to your head.