We Have Lost the Earth

As I drive down these populated roads, and as these colorful dwellings blur past the periphery of my vision, I imagine them gone. I imagine what it must have been like in this place, on this road, when it was nothing more than earth. I imagine what it was like for the first inhabitants to call that spot, and that spot, and that spot home. I imagine horses' hooves trotting down dirty paths, drowned out by the sound of wheels clunking over pebbles and rocks, buried in the terrain. I imagine lovers walking down this path, arm in arm, perhaps a parasol resting atop her delicately hidden shoulder. I imagine life before there was life and whether or not anyone could have imagined what it would be like now.

And then the horrendous sound of a car's outcry steals me back from these halcyon thoughts. I realize I am passing by another monstrosity of a "home," if one could even call it that; after all, how can it be a home when there is more dry wall and cement than people?; than love? I realize that I am passing by another temporal space in which another person will live out his life, having followed in the footsteps of who came before, and having laid down the path for who will come to follow. And then I realize that this is my street, and signaling to the cars around me, I continue my own journey home.