All Them Lights

Several years ago, A. and I watched a documentary about cowboys in Texas. I think it was cowboys. At any rate, it was definitely about people living in rural Texas. 

I've obviously forgotten almost everything about that documentary except this young guy who said he could never live in a city, because (cue heeeeaavy Texas drawl), "All them lights."

It has become a running joke between A. and me. We say it a lot. And we have a lot of opportunity to say it, given the fact that we live somewhere with almost no outside lights for miles.

In fact, yesterday was the first time in five months that I've seen a traffic light.

Does that seem impossible to you? Yeah. It was kind of surprising to me too when I realized it, but it's definitely true.

See, there are no traffic lights in our county, and, due to the world's descent into craziness, I have not left our county since March. A. has been our designated Outside World representative all that time, since I really had no desire to drive 90 miles just to make my children wear masks and fail to distance themselves from other people.

So we haven't left the county. And honestly, I didn't think much about it until yesterday when we drove to one of the tiny cities so Charlie could get a vaccination for school.

Everyone else came, too. My plan was for A. to watch the kids at the park while they ate their picnic lunch and I went to the grocery store. 

And that is how I found myself driving in actual traffic with actual lights for the first time in half a year.

It took me an hour and a half to get through my shopping--mostly due to the quantity of food I buy at one time--and we discovered that's about the amount of time the children actually want to stay at a playground. We never let them stay that long, so we didn't know that's when they finally reach playground satiety, but they were ready to get in the car by the time I got back to them.

I was ready to get in the car and come home, too. All them lights, you know.