A Rare, Almost Private, Highway

If you have ever been stuck in an hour-long traffic jam on a freeway in Los Angeles or Boston or Houston, you will understand (and maybe be amazed) at what I'm about to tell you.

Last fall when I was driving south to join my brothers for our biannual week at our mother's old home in Robert Lee, Texas, I turned south on our usual route (Hwy. 208) from Colorado City.

I've driven that forty-two miles a jillion times, but I don't remember ever having the road all to myself. Shortly after we got out of town that afternoon, a pickup pulling a trailer loaded with construction supplies turned into the entry gate of a ranch, and for the next forty miles I did not see another vehicle going south like I was.

Nobody tailgated me (as they almost always do, since I try to observe the speed limits). I didn't get stuck behind some goof-off more interested in his cell phone than the road ahead of us.

On one incredible segment of that highway, from one hilltop to another you can see a straight stretch at least ten miles long. I looked ahead of me when I got there and behind me when I topped the last hill, and the south-bound lane was empty in both directions. I had my own private highway.

What a rare experience in our crowded, busy, loud world!

Where do you go to get away from the crowd and to escape the noise and bustle so common today? The overhead music in most restaurants these days threatens to explode my hearing aids. And our neighborhood -- once fairly quiet -- got over it. If yours is like mine, three or four mutts yap non-stop all evening long and every few minutes some driver (trying to sound macho?) wracks up his ear-splitting unmuffled muffler and shakes every window on the block.

Some of us used to go to church to find stillness and quiet. Not anymore. Not for most of us. In so many churches today the music rattles the timbers and the preacher yells instead of preaching.

Do you remember the time when Jesus and his men were so frazzled by the huge crowds that he advised them to retreat? "Hey, guys," he urged them, "come with me to a quiet place and get some rest."

Not bad advice for all of us. It blessed my soul to be on that isolated highway alone.

Gene Shelburne may be addressed at GeneShel@aol.com. Get his books or magazines at www.christianappeal.com. His column appears weekly.