There I was, once a lovely tree and now a yellow piece of paper. My new purpose in life — to keep people safe.
On this perfect summer evening the sun was just starting her journey to the other side of Earth. There was a feeling of freedom blown by soft breezes that tussled faint green leaves on the heads of trees lining the four lane highway. Maybe that’s why the car’s driver was driving mindlessly.
Signs were posted, so she could not claim ignorance. At seven p.m. the road was almost deserted but that was no excuse for speeding, or so the officer explained. What a shock the owner had as I was handed to her, a pricey high speed driving award.
She laid me, her new speeding ticket, next to a map for her destination—a mindfulness meditation gathering.
On Memorial Day morning, before 6:00 AM, I was driving on the Ohio Turnpike in the first hour of a five-day cross country trip. from Cleveland to Portland OR. I saw the yellow barrels but they were rolled back for the holiday weekend. I had passed exactly one car since entering the Turnpike. But apparently that was a State Trooper. She pulled me over for speeding in a construction zone. Gave me a ticket that protected me from mindless driving for the rest of the trip. This poem puts it beautifully. THank you for it.