Traveling in Place

Unexpected Crossing

The other day I witnessed something truly wonderful. I was driving home from Syracuse on the Lake Parkway. As I entered the last curve before reaching the village, I could see ahead of me that traffic had stopped. Had there been an accident?

I expected to see the flashing lights of a police car or an emergency rescue vehicle. But as I slowed to a crawl, I was delighted to spot a gaggle of Canada Geese strolling single file across the highway! Four lanes of traffic were at a complete standstill while these birds waddled at a leisurely pace from one side to the other, unconcerned about the potential hazard of their circumstance. Just when it appeared that the parade was over, another few geese that had been sitting in the grass stood up and followed the others. Then a few more got up and did the same. None of them was in the slightest hurry, but each one stayed just close enough to the one ahead of it to make sure the traffic remained at bay. By the time the entire entourage had crossed, cars in all four lanes were twenty or more deep.

The longer this went on, the more I laughed. How remarkable that these unassuming geese innocently strolled across one of the busiest roads in the county, and dozens and dozens of motorists stopped to let them pass. Some of those drivers were no doubt in their usual hurry. Some were probably cursing out loud about the injustice of having to wait. But they were trapped between other cars operated by people who accepted the plain fact that the geese controlled the road, and there was nothing anybody could do about it short of unleashing senseless carnage.

Hope in This Summer's Heat

It’s been a long, hot summer.

I’m not talking about weather. In fact, around here, it really hasn’t been all that hot. It is true that around the world, the planet is getting warming. Permafrost is receding, the ice caps are melting, and sea levels are rising.

But that’s not what I mean, either. It feels like the heat is turned up on the whole culture. Old prejudices that have been hidden away for decades are now celebrated in the light of day. “Hate groups” are claiming a place in the mainstream. Tempers flare easily. Protests provoke counter-protests, and violence ensues. The cultural divides keep widening. We’ve lost any commonly-trusted source of information, so everybody chooses their own facts and shapes reality to fit their biases. Given this state of affairs, it’s hard to see how reconciliation is even possible. Are we beyond the point of no return?

Time will tell. The best-case scenario is that, with all our ugliness on full display, we will begin to deal honestly with the racist and anti-immigrant strains that have plagued our nation since its founding. We’ll never fully exercise these demons, but if we name them, they will lose their power, and a broad consensus will re-emerge across the political spectrum so that no elected official gets away with currying the support of people whose views represent racial, ethnic, religious or any other kind of “supremacy.” Perhaps our current fever will break with a renewed commitment to the common good and a clear, long-term electoral rejection of inherently divisive politics.

But I know it can also go the other way. The cold civil war in which we are engaged might continue to yield violent skirmishes that finally tear us apart. The patchwork of cultures that has made us a beacon of hope to the world just might fray beyond repair. I doubt our culture war will ever turn hot. A war to preserve the union seems far less likely to me than a divorce. There might be two or three