Roads of my life

The drive to the hospital
Takes about thirty minutes
The road is lined with places
From my present and my past

East on Highway 62
There's where Glenda lives
A friend from work
Who I had half-naked in my office this afternoon
There was no hanky-panky going on
Just putting some pain patches on her back

Kersey Valley Road
That's where my landlord lives

Turn left on Interstate 85
Towards Greensboro
But if I went straight instead
That would take me
To Coltrane Mill Road
Where I used to live with my folks
And to the river and the old dam

There's Eastside Wastewater Treatment Plant
Off Riverdale Road and I-85
Where Aloha and Georgia worked
When Wolfmoon and I first met them
God, the hours we spent out there
Playing cards on the weekends
Watching them dance in the parking lot
Watching the baby foxes
Watching them work
Watching them fight

Past the Groometown Road exit
Where I'd get off if I were going to Sam's Club
The movies or Best Buy

Here's my exit now, Holden Road
Turn to the right
Over there on the left is the store
Where Kodi and I bought our new bed
The next light to the right goes to the mall
And to the left goes to Guilford Tech
But I'm not turning in either direction
I go straight ahead through the light

Daye Drive, my aunt and uncle
Used to live down that street
My uncle helped pull Wolfmoon's car out from
Where it had gotten stuck on a dirt road
When she'd driven down there one night
So that we could make out

I'm stopped at another light
To the left is Stonesthrow Apartments
Where one of Betsy's brothers used to live
Mom and Dad dropped me off there
And I rode with him up to
Grandfather Mountain to see her
That summer she went to dance camp up there
And she and I hiked up the hillside
At the Highland Games
To smoke one of the joints I'd brought

And across the street on the right
Is Ben L. Smith High School
Where my boyfriend attended
I cruised that parking lot
More than I did my own high school's
Once a swarm of bees
Buzzed through the lot
Scaring the hell out of everyone
And that street to the right leads
To his parents' house
I wonder how they're doing
And if he ever got married
And made them grandparents
Down that street to the left
Is where Ms. Sam used to live
A lady that Mom worked with

Now, I'm at the High Point Rd intersection
And on the right is Bed Bath & Beyond
Where last year Kodi and I spent countless hours
And money shopping for things for our wedding
And over there on the left is the office park
Where Dr. Lent had his last office
Before his wife died
Then he moved his office into his home
For a few years until he retired
He also remarried
It's been over ten years since I've seen him
I still miss him, he was more to me
Than just my chiropractor
He was a friend and a mentor
If there was one thing he taught me it was
It's never too late to be happy

I'm still on Holden Road
But not for much longer
I pass Lindley Park subdivision
Sheryl lives in there somewhere
And turn right onto Wendover Avenue

Then I cross over Friendly Avenue
Over on the right is the greenway trail
Where Wolfmoon and I walked for months
To lose weight before we got married
And just beyond it is Wesley Long Hospital
Where Mom had her hernia surgery on September 29th
Almost a month ago now
Then on the other side of Wendover
Is the Friendly Center Building
Where Mom used to work
Up on the second floor
For an accounting firm
I used to take her to work
And there at the corner of the building
Is where she used to stand
And wave to me as I drove by
Blowing my horn to say good-bye
On my way to work in High Point

Past Benjamin Parkway exit
There on the left is the building
Where my gynecologist's office is

Here's Westover Terrace exit
And there's the building where
Sheryl's office used to be
Where I first told her
I'd met someone new
And had fallen in love
That's where she met Kodi for the first time

There's Battleground Road exit
To the right is the bank
Where I had my first checking account

Stopped at the light on Hill Street
Which at the top of the hill
I gaze at the road ahead
To the next light and my exit
Just beyond it on the left
But as I look farther up the road
My mind follows Wendover on out
Past Greensboro's corporate limits
To where Wendover ends at Burlington Rd
It would take me to where I grew up
And to my elementary and high schools

As I sit waiting on traffic at my exit
I notice Elm Towers standing tall
Daddy laid brick on that building
When I was a little bitty thing
Of only three or four
I remember being on the job site once
And watching him from the ground
I thought it was the tallest building
In the world, but everything is so big
When you're so little
Funny how your perspective
Changes with age

Finally, I take a left onto Virginia Street
Then a sharp right onto Northwood Street
There on the left is Sheryl's Greensboro office
In an old converted warehouse
Up the hill and through the light at Elm Street
And then a left turn and I'm here
My final destination
Moses Cone Hospital
Where I was born, forty-six years ago
Where Wolfmoon's mother died, ten years ago
Where my mother has been for twenty-five days
And counting...

These streets run through the arteries of my life
Like the blood that flows in my veins

10.25.05