I-55 is more than a bingo number. It’s also a north/south interstate running from LaPlace, Louisiana at Interstate 10 to Chicago at U.S. Route 41. Along your journey, you’ll see Memphis, St.Louis and cross the Mississippi River twice. Kyle Sean and his red BMW were stuck in traffic congestion on I-55 just north of Jackson, Mississippi, a town he never really wanted to visit. “I’ll never get to New Orleans,” he thought. He looked at his water gauge. Like his temper, his car was about to boil over. So he reacted the only way knew how: He screamed.
“MOVE!” Kyle shouted as he laid on his horn. “GET OUT OF MY WAY!”
Of course, no one moved.
But they should have. At least he thought so. Because in Kyle Sean’s mind, the world revolved around Kyle Sean. A VP in a mid-sized company, he left a turbulent wake full of broken promises and hearts. It’s a price others pay when you you’re God’s gift to the world.
Next to him in traffic were two men in a old Cadillac (the kind with fins and real steel bumpers.) Both were dressed in white suits and were looking over at Kyle.
“So he’s the one that the Boss wants us to teach a lesson?”
Frank waited for his superior to answer. Instead, he cranked Bruce Springsteen in the eight-track player.
Got a wife and kids in Baltimore jack
I went out for a ride and I never went back
Like a river that don’t know where it’s flowing
I took a wrong turn and I just kept going
Kyle started beating his steering wheel. His rage was still contained in his BMW, but not for much longer. No one but the two old men noticed.
The older angel looked over at the red-faced man and sighed. “Narcissism is a horrible disease, you know it? That turdbucket is sitting in the middle of a packed interstate and he thinks he’s the only person in the world.”
“What are going to do with him?” Frank asked earnestly. “Want to cause his car to boil over?”
“No, that would make the traffic jam worse and cause the other drivers to suffer. Let’s give ol’ TB a little gift to enjoy for his commute. I think I know exactly what will make his day.”
The two men in the old Cadillac nudged up next to the BMW and waved their hands in a strange circular motion.
Kyle reacted by flipping them off. And then his radio turned conked out.
Kyle screamed louder. His screams were muffled by the fine Bavarian glass.
Both men smiled, waved one last time and got off at the Northside Drive exit. “Frank, I want to show you this great bookstore that they have here in Jackson. It’s called Lemuria. If the big man ever signs Bibles, he’ll do it there.”
Kyle looked as the old Caddy pulled off the interstate. His GPS said he had three more miles of this backup. He turned on his radio and his XM radio wasn’t working. He flipped it over to FM and searched for a decent terrestrial radio station. One talk show host was railing on about something that he didn’t really care about, so he flipped it to another station. There, he heard a man shouting.
“Not another blowhard talk show host, ” Kyle grumbled.
But it wasn’t a talk show host. Kyle noticed the man in the car next to him’s mouth moving in sync with what he was hearing on his radio. “What do you mean I’m fired?!? You can’t come in an obliterate my career with the stroke of your pen!!! I have kids and a house payment! How dare you call me and cut my throat over the phone….”
Kyle quickly hit the scan button. For as many people as he had laid off, he had never thought about the other side’s point of view. And for the first time in his life, strangely, he felt a twinge of guilt. The radio locked on another station.
A female’s voice game on the radio. It was the lady on the other side of him. “How can I go through cancer treatments and still keep my family together. But if I don’t, I’ll die and I don’t know who will raise my children. ” Kyle watched as tears began to stream down her high-set cheeks. The woman was beautiful — Kyle would have asked her out if given the chance. And then he saw the child in the backseat. Good Lord. That child might lose his mother and never remember who she was.
Pain seared his heart and he quickly hit the scan button.
There was an older couple talking to each other in a blue Buick. “I don’t know how we’re going to make it unless I find a job. Our Social Security isn’t cutting it and we’re not making anything on our CDs. I don’t want to sell the house, but we can’t afford the taxes.”
That could be his parents. Ugh. He hit the scan again.
“If I fail out of college, how will I tell my parents?”
And again,
“My wife will leave me if I don’t stop drinking.”
And again. And again. And every time he did, he heard another story. And then another.
The narcissist in the red BMW had been given a rare gift: The gift of empathy. The faces in the cars, the total strangers who were in HIS way, were all going through something. And for the first time in his life, he felt their pain.
Jacob sipped on a cup of coffee and read a copy of The Ponder Heart. Frank watched as Kyle’s BMW slowly ease past Banner Hall. “Think he learned his lesson?”
Jacob looked up from his book and over his bifocals, “Not yet. But by the time he gets through the Waterworks Curve, he’s be Mother Theresa. I know he’ll never look at random faces the same again”
Both men laughed. There was nothing like a good traffic jam to teach patience. And as in this case, empathy.
Jacob took another sip of his coffee, “I had forgotten how good a great cup of coffee is.”
Frank looked at his large soda and burped. “I don’t care what Bloomberg says, this stuff is good.”
And out on I-55, a selfish man learned he wasn’t the only person was stuck in life’s traffic jam.
Good one.