Thoughts on Little Blue Lights, Rumble Strips and Perspective

There are many things I understand today, that I did not understand when I was young. Several times in my childhood, when I was too little to see out the front window of our car from my position in the backseat, I used to wonder why, on dark nights, a little blue light would suddenly flash on the dashboard and then, after awhile, disappear and then reappear again. I remember asking my dad about this and thinking about his response: "When no cars are in front of us, I turn the brights on and the blue light comes on. When a car comes, I turn them off." I had no idea what "brights" were. To me, it sounded like the little blue light would come on when no cars were in front of us, and would go off when there were. I was mystified as to the reason, but tossed it to up to one of those things that only adults know.

Another such instance of the limited perspective of childhood was rumble strips. My dad could see them, but we couldn't because we were too short. Inevitably when he would see rumble strips approaching, he would wait until the tires made contact and then snap his fingers. To us it just seemed like when dad snapped his fingers, the car shook and made a loud noise. Again, I was mystified (and a little amazed!).

I reminisce about that everytime I turn on my brights or encounter rumble strips. I now know that the little blue light came on for a reason and my dad isn't a magician.

Still to this day, things happen that I don't understand. I can't see the road ahead and it's still, as it was when I was a kid, a little unnerving. It's nice to be reminded that God's driving the car, everything has a purpose and He knows all about the rumble strips. I can sit back, shrug and relax.

(These were the thoughts going through my head as I drove home 40 minutes tonight in the dark from Brooklyn to Clarks Summit on icy, unfamiliar roads listening to the August Rush soundtrack with my brights on most of the way.)