Stop Lights, Traffic, and a Perfect Drive to School
Almost every day I drive my kids to school. Drake and Cole are 4th graders and Birk is a 2nd grader at St. Charles in Tacoma. It’s always a lot of fun to have a chance to start the day with my boys.
The drive takes 15 to 20 minutes depending on the lights and that’s where things get interesting. We have done the drive for so long that we know every stretch of road and every light along the way, all 20 of them. At one point a few years ago the kids started a game – counting the red lights we get stopped at along the way. My kids have even named certain stretches of road and certain stop lights. There is the “gauntlet;” six stop lights right off the start that you almost never avoid a stop. The “heart breaker;” the stop light right after the “gauntlet” that is almost always green, but when it’s not, it breaks our heart. The “jokesters;” two stop lights next to the Walmart that have never stopped us in all of our years of driving. And finally, there is the “end;” the stop light at the intersection of Mildred and 19th street near TCC. Records have been broken at this stop light.
If we sit stopped for more than six seconds at a red light along the way, it’s a full red light. If it’s less than six seconds, it’s a half red light. Usually, we get to school with a number around 6 or 7. Once and only once, we made it to school with a number of .5; near perfection. That made us all wonder if we would ever have a perfect drive. A score of zero. I told the boys that I thought that before Drake and Cole moved on to Bellarmine, we would definitely have a perfect drive. I know they had their doubts.
Well, today was that day. Our score was zero.
There are not many times in life that you can say you were part of something perfect. I know Drake, Cole, and Birk are bragging to their friends that today’s drive to school was perfect.
I am saying the same thing . . . but for me, this wasn’t the first perfect drive to school I have had with my boys.