Gulliver’s Traffic

by Will Bailey

Pure bliss.

It’s a dead heat. I’m not talking about the epic ongoing battle of Rock, Paper, Scissors Wife and I have been embroiled in for years, I’m talking about the traffic I am currently sitting in. Seems as though there are other people in this city who thought it would be a good idea to show up to their respective places of business by 9 AM. There’s only one problem: the city that I live in, Boston, was originally designed for horses. It’s true. As recently as 1630, Boston was exclusively populated, administrated and maintained by bipedal horses. They trotted up and down the cobblestone streets on their hind legs, wearing wigs and frocks and neighing “Hello” to each other in heavy English accents. It wasn’t until the early 19th century that the talking horses of Boston were driven out of the city and into the country, specifically Burlington, Vermont, by loudmouthed steam engines from New York who smoked a lot and never said “Hello.” Flash forward to the 21st century, and the city has been reduced to a system of elevated parking lots that all lead to the same baseball field. The irony is that I actually don’t mind sitting in traffic. In addition to allowing me ample opportunity to pretend I am fleeing an alien invasion, it also makes me feel much closer to my fellow members of the non-talking horse race. Because, really, there’s no better way to feel you are part of the Family of Man by glancing to your left and right and seeing nothing but miserable cretins hunched over their steering wheels, wishing an alien invasion would send us all back to a simpler time. A time of subsistence farming, butter churning and, of course, talking horses.

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