A Musing From The Road

Most of the time I drive, I'm impatient to get where I'm going and thus, easily irritated by other drivers (I've said in the past I'd enjoy driving much more without all the other cars around).

Every so often, I have a day where I have someplace to be, but there's no rush, and I drive accordingly. Counting today, I think this year's count is up to 3. The varied road construction didn't delay get in the way very often, I mostly avoided annoying drivers, the weather was nice (if a bit windy), and the leaves around here finally turned colors in earnest in the last few days. The maples and hickories had started earlier, but the majority are oaks, and they seemed to wait until it warmed back up a little, oddly enough. Or it takes them a few days to react to a frost. One or the other.

I did see a sign in front of a church. You know the little messages they like to use to get your attention. 'Even Jesus had a fish story', is my personal favorite. This one wasn't amusing, 'The truth can sometimes seem intolerant' isn't much of a gutbuster. But I did spend a fair few miles trying to decide what particular stance that church was taking others were deeming intolerant. I figured either anti-gay marriage, or anti-abortion, but that's me being judgmental. I suppose they could be really steadfast in a belief that cake is always better than pie, and they're facing a barrage of insults from pie-lovers.

If I had seen it yesterday, when I did a lot of driving in pouring rain, surrounded by even worse drivers than normal, I would have fumed about it. As it was, I though of how it sounds like a new way to excuse being a jerk. There are people who say cruel things, then try to justify it under the heading of "telling it like it is". By now, everyone recognizes that's code for, "I'm a complete ass and enjoy it". Now they can say, "sometimes the truth seems intolerant", and it'll confuse the people they're talking to. It has more of an air of sage wisdom than glibness, even though it is kind of glib.