Take a Left
“Take Monroe to I-10 and make a left. Stop when you see the ocean.”
It was our joke for years, until the day I did it.
This section of I-10 is under construction. I passed a sign that warned of roadwork 12 miles hence. Three miles later the traffic stopped. The traffic stopped and here I sit, in that bit of Louisiana that is all bridges over water and mosquitoes and half-dead Paleolithic foliage. I don’t mind so much. I have lots of good music and anyway every bit of this is an adventure – my adventure – and I won’t wish any part of it away. It’s been an hour now, an hour of creeping forward hopefully and braking again. The creeping was always hopeful but the braking has only just now reached the despair stage because I really, really have to pee. I still haven’t reached the section of interstate that is actively being worked on.
This section of I-10 is empty. The nearest city is so far behind me that the stars lay scattered above me like a net filled with diamonds. I could reach up and pluck them from the sky. There’s no one else on this patch of road at this time of night, so I don’t worry too much about paying attention. I set the cruise control to 80 and look at the sky and imagine myself flying, falling up through the stars.
I reach a customs station where all vehicles are compelled to stop. The customs officer speaks with the driver in front of me for a long time before finally letting him pass. I pull up.
“Hello.”
“Hi.”
“Are you a US citizen?”
“Yes.”
“Have a nice night.”
“Wait. Um…did I go to Mexico? I’m still on I-10, right?”
I’ve been driving for a long time.
“You didn’t cross. You just came awfully close.”
I’m still in Texas, forever in Texas it seems, and this section of I-10 would be beautiful were it not for the desiccated deer corpses that litter the roadside. The land and the trees are differing shades of gray-green. The trees look tortured by some relentless wind. The road is hilly, the speed limit 10 mph higher for cars than for trucks. I swoop and soar and use my turn signals judiciously for every 18-wheeler I pass, trying to avoid the death all around me.
This section of I-10 is crowded but moves along at a brisk, not-unreasonable pace. To the left and right is nothing but Arizona desert, but people live here somehow. For some reason they sink their anchors into this ground and they stay. I look for those “Last Chance Gas” signs like you see in the movies but there aren’t any. No bleached white buffalo skulls either, but there are tumbleweeds and cacti and a blue sign that reads:
State Prison
Surprise
Wildlife Zoo
I have to pull over again as I enter into California. I don’t know why. The border agents are chatting with each other across the cars, and mine doesn’t even look at me before she waves me through. I want to follow I-10 all the way to the ocean, but I leave it before I get there. I have an appointment and the traffic has become terrifying. In time the traffic – the mass of it, the speed – will frighten me less, I’m sure of it.
I’m here. I took Monroe to I-10 and took a left. I’m here. Where are you?
Rivka Jacobs
I like this story a lot. To me, it’s about making changes in ones life. The road trip as a metaphor for change. Personally, I’d be terrified to up and move to California, so I admire the heroine for “taking Monroe to I-10″ and taking a left.
Reply
Cynthia Lugo
Confession: there’s absolutely nothing fictional about this story. I took that left at the end of January and here I am, 2,500 miles and 2 months later, unemployed in Los Angeles. Thanks for the kind words!
Reply
Nicolas Papaconstantinou
I read this as a tone-poem, and in that way, I can come back again and again, and revel in the journey.
Rivka’s right – there’s a feeling of emotional free-fall to the journey your narrator is taking, and a hanging note there at the end that is unsettling.
But I like it a lot!
Reply
Cynthia Lugo
Thanks Nicolas! It was meant to have a sort of dream-like quality, although it’s not as smooth as I would have liked it to be.
Reply