202: Woo-Hoo!

Today is The Day. It’s a life-affirming, life-changing day. It’s the dawn of a new epoch. They finally finished widening the lanes on Route 202! I felt like pulling my car over, getting out and starting a parade!

My commute this morning, at least a few miles of it, was over three luxurious lanes, rather than two cramped and crappy lanes. I left my house 10 minutes late and still got to work 10 minutes early. The construction crews looked to be pretty much done a few weeks ago so I had been waiting with great anticipation. For the last few days, they had been putting the finishing touches on everything: dusting the concrete, hanging photos and arranging potted plants to give the highway a little atmosphere.

Now it’s all open and that sign that lists the commute ahead will start saying “6 miles, 6 minutes” instead of “6 miles, 483 minutes.” I don’t know what to do with this few extra minutes per day. Maybe I’ll take up needlepoint or stare soulfully out the window.

Few people alive today remember what 202 was like before all the construction. The world was different then. Hillary Clinton was just an obscure Cabinet member, we used our smart phones strictly for talking rather than for Pokemon Go, Isis was an Egyptian goddess, and Justin Bieber was a bratty teen who had not yet danced his way into the hearts of America. Those three pristine lanes open into a world very different than when the first orange cones went up.

Amid all this joy, let us pause and remember those old-timers who went to their graves never knowing when the road work would be completed, never knowing the joy of four lanes merging into three instead of four merging into two.

Now I look forward very much to my drive home. I’m sure the other 20 miles of my commute will be choked with traffic due to rampant overdevelopment, a lack of alternative roads and inadequate infrastructure, but for a few miles, I’ll be blissfully sailing along.