It is nail-biting, inching toward ‘The Intersection with No Sign.’ It is the drawn-out stress I haven’t felt since speeches in high school, sitting in my desk while Mr. Mickel hemmed and hawed over who ought to go next, knowing I should volunteer and get it over with but failing to raise my hand all the same. All approaches to ‘The Intersection’ are blind up till about half-block before, the left and right concealed by the towering office buildings of downtown Dallas.
The radio cuts in and out. There is supposed to be a pirate station, one that dedicates itself solely to traffic at ‘The Intersection with No Sign,’ attempting to coach vehicles into order from an unknown birds-eye perch. That station is quiet today, which is not uncommon but certainly inconvenient. Traffic is bad. Cars move slowly ahead. The height of the RV allows me to see a brief glimpse of the chaos ahead. A compact car has been signally right for nearly three minutes. It decides, last minute, to go straight. An oncoming truck bullies its way forward. The two graze. Horns begin to honk as the two drivers exit their vehicles to assess the damage.
At least they don’t live in their cars.
‘Every attempt to add signage to ‘The Intersection with No Sign’ has failed spectacularly, it being a running and highly conservative joke about the price of personal freedoms and small government and such. This extends, even, to measures that would ease traffic around ‘The Intersection,’ modifying certain one-way streets so that it would not be so vital to rush hour traffic in one of the city’s busiest strips of road.
No, ‘The Intersection with No Sign’ is the pet disaster of the locals and it is something of a spectacle when the planets align and approaching cars zip smoothly past each other, caught in a shared dance that is equal parts skill and happenstance.
Of course, ‘The Intersection with No Sign’ averages seven fatalities each year. Hardly the most dangerous destination on the Wayside, we leave it to the reader to decide whether this particular juice is worth the squeeze.’
-an excerpt, Autumn by the Wayside
