Open letter to my ride home.

Dear my ride home,

I love you, because you are a space in between. Think of it: I put my laptop into my bag. I gather my coat,  my half-empty water bottle, find my sunglasses, put on my gloves, and in general pull myself together. I walk out into the cold late afternoon, the walks and parking lot beginning to ice again. I put my bag in the back and my purse in the front, start the car, pull out of the parking lot. My ride home, this is where you begin.

On the way, I think of many things. Of what I will do when I get home, of what I will read, watch, eat. Of the dog and his greetings. I think of my children and all the places they are, of their travels and their work. I think about the hour my husband will arrive, of the small interval between when I get home and when he will. Of what I might make for dinner. Of what will arrive in the mail.

Of course there is the hum of the little list I have made of what else must be done. For there are always things that must be done. I think as I drive that I might take my laptop into the warmest room of the house, set up a set of consultations for next week or send an e-mail. Make a poster. Review some drafts. But even there, my ride home, even there, you are the soft, moving space in which I lay hands upon my volition: what I want to do and what I must, and the warm room waiting for me, in which I will make my decisions between them.

My ride home, no day begins without my imagining you at the end of it.

htms