Isolation Boxes

People often ask me if I am readjusting well to being home. You know what is the part that felt strange the longest? Being in a car.

I don't mean the act of driving. Driving my car actually feels normal. The strange part is being alone while going from once place to another.

I heard that a DTS professor once called cars "isolation boxes" after returning from world travels. I get it now. I agree.

In a driving city like Dallas, there are rarely nods and smiles and hellos as people pass each other in the street. I don't mean people are rude as they pass each other, I mean they just don't often come in contact! I sit in my car looking forward and usually listening to music. I don't look around and smile at other drivers. I shudder to think of what would happen if I did! I plan a little extra buffer time for traffic, not for conversation time as I did in Guatemala.

Traveling by car is not a bad thing. God knows it offers conveniences I love. Not to mention safety. But I now have a sense of isolation in cars that I did not have pre-Guatemala. Just saying.