Joyriding

They say life is a highway...but some of us prefer to take the scenic route, to enjoy our stroll or our little bike ride. To see people, not trapped in metal cages, defined by what they have on, by what has them. A smile is a mighty fine currency on a Saturday morning in the park--a real smile that comes with crinkly eyes as a life-long friend. One poet talked about two roads diverging in a wood, about the paralyzing indecision about his prospective rout: weighing the merits of this road's winding curves, that one's smooth, walkable surface gravel skin. It always seemed strange that one would judge where to invest their next step this way, as if roads are not just mere routes to some destination, means to an end--why not choose the road that could take you therem quicker, wherever there might be. But, I'm beginning to see that some cliche's exist for a reason, and sometimes that reason is that they contain the truth--sometimes it's about the journey, not the destination. We all go to the same place--the place from whence we came--some day...so why not take our time. Why not savor the peddling, even as it aches and we sweat, savor the shifting from gear to gear and stage to stage, acting as we may, as expressions of genuine joy, breezing through our favorite park on a wing-breeze Summer day?