I have often said that we are so much alike than we are different that is actually pretty wild. We are all affected by the same things every single day, when we look past money and all the bells and whistles of life.
Mother Nature evens out the playing field for us and that is just the beginning of things. We are all affected by traffic and other things of everyday life. This goes beyond race, gender, age and more, we are just all basically the same.
Here is what got me thinking about this. I was in Orange Beach recently and there is a back road, that is busy, but it moves pretty smoothly to get around all the beach traffic. On this road, there is something that has always confused us and probably will forever.
A Roundabout. Yes, a Roundabout. It does not matter your level of education, or how much money you have, or how much life experience you have, a Roundabout will always win and put drivers in absolute peril, when it doesn’t have to be that way.
I saw a driver in a 2026 Escalade, probably worth $100K, get so confused on a Roundabout that the drive just stopped. The car behind him, which I was behind, almost slammed into that car. The Escalade proceeded ahead and stopped again on the other side. This continued for about fifteen seconds. Then me, in my 2015 Subaru, got confused because of the car in front of me and a car that pulled out in front of him and I was almost hit by a guy in a Sanford & Son truck.
I finally made it through and was amazed no one was hit in that absolute confusion. I told someone at the restaurant about that where I went for dinner and he said there are wrecks there all the time. We are smart people, I know we are, but for some reason we cannot figure out a Roundabout.
The naked statues in Nashville on Demonbreun–good lord trying to get through there unscathed. There is another Roundabout near Opry Mils and the same result, no one can figure it out. Cars not stopping; cars not going; cars go and stop in the middle and on and on.
I had to pass through the Roundabout in Orange Beach about twenty times while I was there and every time, it felt like a Rubiks Cube for cars and adults. You think you have it figured out but we really don’t. Same scene as earlier and every kind of car moving through there, just trying to make it to the other side.
I will never look at a Roundabout the same way again and when some one tries to tell me that we are splintered and fractured nation, I will tell them the story of said Roundabout. A Roundabout that none of us can figure out and makes me realize, we are more alike than not.