Home Can be the Pennsylvania Turnpike

Sometimes I listen to music or a book, or practice a speech in my head or listen to a policy CD, or talk radio as I drive back and forth on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Yep, Billy Joel was right, "Home can be the Pennsylvania Turnpike" when you drive it so often! Tonight, however, I listened intently, switching from station to station as the miles melted away as I progressed across the state, to listen to the Presidential debate live, without commentary. I caught almost every word as Senators McCain and Obama discussed, and at times, argued, over the future of our economic and foreign policy. I was proud, once again, to be an American, where citizens get to choose their leaders. I am not cynical about this --- of course, I know who I am supporting, but nonetheless, it was good to hear that we have a real choice to make. I wonder how many citizens simply take this all for granted, wishing, perhaps, that the usual TV and radio programming isn't preempted ?
Other days, I let the radio pick the station switching from NPR and soft rock to Christian and country stations as I reach the middle of the state.
I watch the farms, too, taking note of a particularly tidy farmhouse where jeans and dresses often hang neatly on the clothesline early in the morning, supplemented some times with camouflage pants and jackets during deer season. I saw this industrious farmer's wife one Sunday, not working, but walking two little children up the driveway, wearing a cotton dress, her hat neatly captured in a bun and net. What was she thinking I wondered ? Was she wondering where we, on the highway nearby, were going ? Me, I was wondering what her life was like. And in a moment, I was a mile away.