White Lines and Red Lights

Do you ever get this feeling?

The feeling you get when you're on a plane

listening to and watching the flight attendants perform their ritual,

waiting for the time that you'll finally be allowed to plug into your electronic devices,

perhaps actually reading the safety pamphlet this time

because, hey, you never know,

this could be the day,

and you feel as though your life has been made up of an endless amount of plane rides that seem to both sever and connect you to the different people you call home?

The feeling you get when you're riding in a car for hours upon hours,

watching the lines in the road transform from dotted to solid to dotted and then solid

over and over and over again,

watching mountains stand tall and still,

small objects blur and fly,

and you feel as though your life has been made up of an eternity of aching leg trips in cars, looking out the windows to everywhere, anywhere, and nowhere all at once?

The feeling you get when you're standing quietly in a long line of strangers,

waiting;

waiting for absolutely anything you can think of,

a candy bar at a gas station,

a textbook from the bookstore,

a passage through security,

a box of fries at a fast food joint,

waiting for absolutely anything at all,

and you feel as though your life has been made up of an infinite amount of time spent waiting in lines among a multitude of people you've shared breath, you've shared space with, who you don't even know?

The feeling you get when you're sitting in a class listening to,

or more often than not, attempting to listen to,

the various teachers and the various subjects you've faced throughout your life,

and you find yourself counting the seconds and minutes passing on that little red stick in the clock,

til the hour is up,

even sometimes when you're enjoying the material,

for then you'll be cleared to leave

and it doesn't really matter to where you go, as long as you leave,

and you feel as though your life has been made up of a continuum of classrooms and whiteboards and four walls and that fluorescent light bulb buzz?

I feel all of those things sometimes.

But life is really made up of each one of those parts.

Each one of those parts that somehow fit together to make a whole.

A whole that is your life.

Yet sometimes you just can't help but feel like you're whole entire existence has been compiled of nothing but a never ending, tangled up strand of white lines and red lights.