Spanning over 1,300 miles, the 5 freeway runs border-to-border—from the US-Mexico border in Southern California to the US-Canada border in northern Washington. In the Golden State, 796 miles of the 5 cut through the coastlines, valleys, and deserts. With Californians driving over 13,000 miles a year, the freeway is an integral part of both the California lifestyle and landscape.
Whether you live in the dark and dirty streets of Los Angeles, the manicured boulevards of Mission Viejo, or the seaside bliss of La Jolla, the 5 is a constant part of the local landscape. It becomes a part of your diction in a way, a language that is lost on non-residents.
You realize this when you are elsewhere, driving up the streets of Tampa, referring to every overpass, inner-city highway, and exit ramp as “the freeway.” You don’t call them the “interstate” or “highway.” You default to the freeway. You realize how weird this is when you are telling a coworker that you picked your parents up at the Orlando International Airport the night before.
“Yeah,” you say, “Traffic on the 4 was crazy. Ya know, cuz of Labor Day weekend.”
“What?” she asks you. She stops making Amy’s mocha latte with no whipped cream to give you her full attention.
“I took the 4 to pick up my parents. Traffic was unreal.”
“You took what?”
“The 4. You know, the freeway.”
“Oh, yeah,” she says, finally turning back to Amy’s drink, “Yeah.”
Everyone else from Tampa that you know calls it “I-4” or “the interstate” but to you, it is an extension of the California freeway system. You have unconsciously replaced the “I’s” with “the’s.” It feels snug when it rolls off your tongue, like when you hear someone roll their r’s in Spanish. You haven’t even made the 2,500-mile drive to California, yet you already feel like a local.
You remember when you took the 5 with your boyfriend and his mom from Los Angeles. You looked at the little spaces from car-to-car and you thought it was some kind of magic that everything flowed the way it did. It was like a river, the lifeblood of the area that brought everyone together, yet never brought them too close. You looked at the exits and overpasses and the hundreds of California license plates that were whizzing by you every second.
You watched a white Lexus merge in front of you, orange blinker bopping to the beat of your soundtrack for the day—The B-52's album “Wild Planet.” Your boyfriend’s mom slowed down ever-so-slightly to give the Lexus enough room. The car behind her did the same and the car behind that car did so too. Like a gently flowing stream, the 5 flowed onward, carving through the land like the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. You see how suburbs and cities bend their will to the power of the 5, the entire shape of these places giving way for the powerful river of cars.
You tap your boyfriend on the shoulder. He is bobbing his head to the tune of “Private Idaho,” but he turns to look at you, smiling. You point out the Washingtonia and Mexican Fan Palms alongside the freeway, excitedly tapping your finger against the glass as you zoom by them at 70 miles per hour. He looks at you with more love in his eyes than you’ve ever seen anyone have for you and he kisses you, holding you in a soft embrace that makes you forget you’re one of many in a 1,300-mile river. You only feel his gentle arms holding you so softly as you pass by the palm trees and billboards and a freeway exit. He stops kissing you, but still holds you close in his delicate arms. You don’t want to leave the 5 or your boyfriend or the HOV lane. You’re content with just staying right here.
When you see the twin peaks on the horizon, you know you’re home. Old Saddleback looms over the Orange County portion of the 5, keeping watch over the quickly-flowing river. It makes sure that the babbling brook never stops moving and always keeps its perfect music no matter what time of day it might be. You watch your boyfriend’s mother put her right turn signal on, leaving the left lane and slowly crossing over to the far-right lane. She follows the rhythm of the other vehicles on the road, her car drifting like a twig on the riverbed.
We get off the freeway at exit 88, flowing from a wide river to a narrow stream. The car slows to match the music of this new ecosystem. 70 miles an hour becomes 55, then 45, then 40, then 0. Your boyfriend’s mom missed the first light after the freeway and now the car is awash in an otherworldly stop sign red glow.
Your boyfriend, still with his arm around you, pulls you in for another kiss. Your lips to his, you are illuminated in the headlights of the cars around you. You pull always and turn to look at the freeway behind you, interstate shield reflecting in the taillights and headlights and streetlights. Your eyes aglow with the magic of the freeway, you fall into his arms, holding him tightly, yet delicately. You feel his soft hands on your shoulders and he giggles. You feel his lips on your cheek.
The light turns green. Next to you, someone honks their horn.
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