Cecil Baldwin

It had been a long time since Ruth had talked about or even thought about that image of herself, smiling in a bright light.

Ruth's daughter wanted to try In-N-Out, had heard so many amazing things, and the food was good.

It was fine.

It was totally okay.

They sat eating totally okay burgers.

And Ruth's daughter took the little paper packets of salt and started laying them on the table, a mindless bit of activity.

But Ruth stared at the packets because it seemed to her that her daughter was spelling something out, a word in a language that neither of them understood.

And if Ruth could only decipher that word, then she would finally be free.

but she couldn't read it.

And soon enough, her daughter swept the salt packets back into their little container.

You seem to be doing okay, her daughter lied, because her flight was that afternoon and she didn't want to change it.

Yeah, I am.

I totally am, Ruth lied, because she did not know how to express the truth.

And now, Traffic

Humanity is about division.

A world of walls, of fences, of lines in the sand, of neat little dividers, of signs saying do not enter, of signs saying private property, of concrete medians and sunny little grass strips, of moats and decorative fountains, and other lines constructed of water.

of artificial beaches and artificial islands, of signs that say, members only or employees only, of languages that are unintelligible to each other but describe the same basic human experience, of people that imagine those around them to be profoundly different from themselves, of people who are working from a set of misunderstandings they aren't even aware exist.

This is what humans do.

They divide.

They map out divisions.