Driving on a lonely fog bound road

The sun has just risen, but you only know that because the mist that surrounds you and separates you from the rest of the world glows. Darkness and headlit fog gives way to gray and white pockets of clouds that settle in the low lands and clings to the trees. You can only see a few yards ahead. There is no one else on the road.

Maybe you've left the world that you were in yesterday. Maybe during the night while you slept, time stopped and you moved on, or maybe it was the other way around and time and the world moved on and left you sleeping, unaware that you would wake up alone. As you drive, you realize that you haven't seen anyone during the hour that you've been on the road. You should've at least passed a house or a barn or seen an animal by now.

The flashing yellow light ahead tells you an intersection is near. But the fog and the shapes of trees closes in on all four corners as you roll slowly through, glancing left and right and seeing nothing but a hundred feet of empty tree-lined road ending in a bank of mist in each direction. You wonder if perhaps you should have turned. You have the nagging feeling that today you were supposed to arrive somewhere, but you aren't sure anymore.

You glance at the gas gauge. You can go at least a hundred more miles before that's a concern. You check your cell phone knowing that there will be no signal. Attempts at finding a radio station are fruitless, the static varies in pitch and you hear the occasional squeal that could have been a person or a song, but it isn't and you give up, surprised that you feel relief that no one is intruding on your solitary trek through the morning fog.

The road curves gently, you drive over a bridge and the fog obscures what you are crossing. You wonder if it was train tracks or a small river. Should you stop and listen? Silence doesn't really exist, does it? You will hear something. The rustling of the trees, a snap of a twig, maybe a trickle of water, or even distant birdsong.

You decide to keep driving, keep moving, trusting that this will end at some point, that the fog will burn away, and then you see someone driving toward you. First, it is only the headlights, then as it gets closer, it seems to be an old pickup truck. You can't see who is driving and the rumble of the engine sounds distant and subdued. You resist the urge to flash your headlights, to have them pullover or at least slow down and stop next to you and you both roll down your windows and say "hello". You consider warning them of the loneliness of the road they're about to take, or asking if they know this road and what that bridge crosses. You want to ask them about the way they have come. You reach for the lights and blink them, but it is too late, the truck zips past, looking old and rusty and sounding as loud as jet engine after the stillness you've experienced all morning.

The sound and the panicked desire you felt to ask about the road ahead has snapped you out of your drowsy reverie. Now you feel thirsty and your stomach rumbles. You realize that you aren't sure which road you're actually traveling. With the stubborn fog refusing to burn or blow away, you aren't sure which direction your heading. You remember that you planned on arriving at home by nightfall.

You're in the real world. You just saw a truck. It wasn't driving itself. The fog, so peaceful and introspective, now feels oppressive and limiting, a personal boundary that moves with you. Maybe the truck drove into the fog as it neared you and drove right out of it into a beautiful sunlit morning as it passed.

You take a deep breath and put your hands at ten and two on the steering wheel and press your back into the seat. You mash the accelerator and feel the car surge forward. You have a fleeting thought that driving fast in such limited visibility is unsafe and foolish, but you need to get out of this. You need to see other people, some sign of civilization.

And just as your thoughts turn dark, wondering if you are trapped in a bad horror story or that you died in your sleep and this is your own personal hell, certain that you'll drive this lonely fog bound road forever, you see a highway sign and then a speed limit sign and then, tears of relief roll down your cheeks as you see the turn in and the half full parking lot of a Wal-Mart.