eisenhower.

Last Tuesday I got behind the wheel of my car and drove to Florida.* 24 hours. 1,400 miles. 11 states. 0 requests for passports, 0 check points, 0 guards inspecting the trunk, 0 inquisitive looks at an unmarried woman travelling with two men. During my 11pm-2am shift on the return trip, I looked up at the quiet, starry sky over North Carolina and realized for the first time in my easy American life, I'm free.

I'm surprised this never occurred to me sooner, considering how many long road trips I've taken. Some trips have been for fun, a car full of college students en route to my home in Florida for spring break; other trips were somber and dutiful, travelling from Boston to Philadelphia to share the final days of a dear friend's father; my favorite trips were the ones I took alone, driving myself to and from college, 13 uninterrupted hours on I-95 with the windows down and my ponytail blowing wildly against my neck. As a young girl and then a young woman, travelling unaccompanied in my own car across the lines of so many cities and states should have felt as limitless as it was: I was free to go anywhere, to do anything.

On June 29, 1956, President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave Americans what I believe to be the most tangible meaning of freedom: highways. Thanks to the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, we have a highway system where anyone with a driver's license can go anywhere with anyone to do anything. You turn the ignition, put the car in drive, and go. When you've reached your destination, or you run out of money, or just get bored, you stop. Unless you're wanted by the law, or are suspected of criminal activity, or are blatantly breaking a traffic law, you're free.**

The way I felt under the stars in North Carolina was the opposite of how I felt in Jordan. For two females, my friend and I enjoyed an envious amount of freedom (she has her own car and apartment), and as Americans we were automatically seen as red, white, and blue scribbles outside the straight lines of the Middle East. But we were nonetheless required to open the trunk for a weapons inspection, hand over our passports (she has a Jordanian resident ID and speaks Arabic, so she received more smiles than I did), and explain ourselves. The Kingdom of Jordan itself is safe and peaceful, so the stops on the highways were only about as frequent as a toll booth on a turnpike (there were additional checkpoints at higher security areas, such as my friend's school, the airport, the Dead Sea, etc.). They were not unpleasant or even random checks - they checked every car and person - but they were reminders that we did not have the rare and often refreshing opportunity to be anonymous, to lose ourselves in the drive, the wind, and the music, to drive for hours in silence if we wanted. Every so often, men with guns would want to make sure we weren't up to trouble.

I understand this. It's a practice that in principle I find frustrating and counterproductive to the ideals of peace, progress, and faith in humanity, but it's a practice like many others that I sadly understand. At the airport I dread taking off my shoes and walking across a grimy carpet after other barefooted passengers, and I want to shake the kids working at the scanners and say, "Do you honestly think that any of us have bombs in our shoes? We're just trying to get home!" And then the news on Christmas Day reported a man's attempt to ignite an explosive on a plane. I hate taking off my shoes, but I understand. There are idiots, terrorists, and horrible, horrible people who will try to hurt other people, who don't value human rights, and who rob the rest of us of our kindergarten belief that everyone is a friend.

This understanding guided me through each check point in Jordan; while I was annoyed that we once again had to prove that we were friendly tourists who meant no harm, I understood that these checks were here because there were unfriendly travelers who did mean harm. So I handed over my passport when asked, answered questions, and deferred to my friend to do the explaining in Arabic.

No amount of patient understanding, however, could make me feel less restrained in those moments. I wanted to drive on, drive past, drive forward. I wanted to drive forever if I could, crossing lines into new lands while leaving others behind, watching the cherry blossom trees of Washington, D.C. bloom into the Spanish moss-covered live oaks of Gainesville, the homemade painted signs of Savannah brighten to the neon lights of Miami Beach. I wanted to drive down the coast without anyone asking why.



By 1956 we'd come a long way as a nation. Civil Rights would be our next major feat; we'd tackled slavery, women's suffrage, and established the United Nations. I don't know if I would have seen the significance of the highway system if I'd been alive on the day President Eisenhower gave it life. It's an obvious instrument of convenience, public works, and progress as a nation continually trying to connect people from Maine to Washington to California to Texas to Florida. But somewhere along I-95 in my Honda Civic this winter, I realized that these interstate roads are the very stripes of freedom, stretching across the nation with the stars shining boldly above.





*I was not alone. My boyfriend, his brother, and I took shifts driving, navigating, and sleeping. We decided in advance that this would be easier, cheaper, and less aggravating than flying to Florida for the holidays, and we were absolutely right.

**My boyfriend wisely pointed out that we enjoy this interstate freedom because we are not in the midst of a civil war, as many countries are. I also realize that there is a very real problem with racial and ethnic profiling by policemen. However, to this point I say that my musings are specifically on major highways, not city streets and roads, where there is more frequent patrolling.