It’s 7:30 AM, and as usual, I’m running late for work. The Friday schedule requires attendance for four hours which fulfills the social obligation of working 40 hours per week. Productivity, live it.

The morning light gives away any secrets that the day may have. It’s about to be the end of summer, as July wanes and August waxes, and the heat of the day is already forcing the moisture in the air to move up, forming tall cloud ships. The city looks fresh, the temperature is tolerable, and the background roar of the start-of-the-day traffic is somewhat muted by the morning air.

My motivation has once again slipped, as I contemplate another day of un-fulfilling engineering. I know I’m new here, but as today ends up my second week on the job, I’m feeling uncertain and, here I’ll whisper, bored. Bored. There I said it out load this time. Bored. It’s no surprise that things start off slow at a new job (remember SMA?), but given all of the angst capital that I spent at PB, I’m not real happy about the questions regarding my career knocking on my office door so soon after I arrive.

The drive has taken on its own shape this morning. No talk radio on the drive this morning, replaced by tunes stored on the Pod. Music has become less of a presence in my daily life, as liberal talk radio seems to be more of a time sink than music. Inane talk from the hosts and the callers blends in with the roar of the AC in my office, and allows me to assign part of my brain to pay attention to what’s being said.

The drive continues. There is a memory stirring. It moves and stretches and gradually paints a mental picture of morning drives spread through the decades. There are the drives to work with Doug in the car, preparing for another day hoping for no break downs from our almost psychotic boss. Beautiful morning drives ripe with the opportunities that life provides when you are 22 years old. Morning drives through towns in Oregon as I haul ass to another week working on the coast, where the sounds of the Pacific blend into the background of electric saws and hammers. Oregon towns that are only remembered as wide roadways lined with the usual detritus of the 1980’s economy. Used car dealers, hardware stores, cafes, and 7-11’s. I wonder if this memory is of anything that really exists or is it made up of a conglomerate of the other wide roadways I have driven in the AM through the course of my life.

I remember how driving through ‘burque was fun, and how it occasionally became an effort to be loathed due to a way too familiar routine. I remember how driving through new towns kindled the sense of adventure and discovery of a young man in search of someplace to land. In search of someone to hold and love. In search of a livelihood that would pay the bills but would allow him to fully participate in a continuing adventure. This adventure included establishing a sense of self that would allow him to grow, to fight, to win and lose, to make money, to spend money, to risk his life playing, to risk his life working, to finding his first true love. So long ago, and the memories have faded.

The urban roadway this morning has started to become a reflection of the many drives made and the thousands of miles witnessed from behind the wheel. The road, at its best, becomes a stream of life that passes him bye in a detached observational way. The curb cuts, the driveways on either side of the road represent all of the unseen opportunities that beckon perpendicular to the direction he is going. I drive with somewhat of a purpose, as its Friday, and I need to go to work for four hours to satisfy my vague commitment to a career.

Peace.