Also known as a roundabout, a traffic circle is a road junction where you yield, get in, and then either exit or go straight.
Or, if you’re totally confused, you may drive around and around and around, not sure when and where you’re supposed to get out.
I was at breakfast with my friend Dori, who is one of the first people I met when I re-booted and moved to Arizona. During the sixteen months since I met her, we have both transformed many aspects of our lives. (She is a hair and make-up stylist, so her vocation revolves around metamorphoses.)
We talked about how some people are stuck in the roundabout, others are just tooling along in the right lane (sometimes blocking those who want to exit), many just travel along at or slightly above the speed limit, and others discover the HOV lane and, with the help of their shotgun passenger(s) are able to arrive sooner at their destinations.
And so is life after 50.
I’ve always been a bit of a speed racer. My cousin played “The Flash” on the TV show “Smallville.” Quick decisions and deliberate actions are in my DNA. Of course, I’m capable of slowing down or stopping. I’ll always get off the road to explore that funky metaphorical dive diner. Or lie on the beach and brown, while reading a book. But my veins are filled with high-test fuel and I like my life at that pace. If I’m “traveling” with the speed limit people, I can be a great passenger. I respect their pace and keep them entertained on the road.
Sadly, many of my peers are stuck at 15mph in the roundabout. And they can’t (or don’t want to) get off. They constantly look in the rear view mirror and think only about where they’ve been rather than where they’re heading.
As I enter the second quarter of the year, I contemplate where I want to go next in my work, life, and road trips. I see many of my peers simply circling. The angrier ones will honk and flip other drivers off as they go around and around and around.
Remember, you can always take a new route. You just have to put your destination into your metaphorical Waze and give yourself a little power.