Stopping On The Road With Sausage Bread

"The more I travelled, the more I realized that fear makes strangers of people who should be friends."
-Shirley MacLaine

On Monday we drove home, away from our friends and back to our ordinary life. As we travelled South we noticed something up ahead on the road. We were forced to slow slightly, then to a barely discernible crawl, and then stop entirely.
The freeway was at a standstill, that was soon clear. Cars were not simply idling: one by one people began to emerge from their vehicles, to walk around, to stretch their legs and in one case, to give their dogs some exercise. As people began to wander about, more were inspired to do the same until the road resembled a busy meeting place.
Somebody close by said they thought the traffic was halted for a length of fifteen miles. Gossip swept along through the chain of cars with a fervour.
As I mused on the peculiarity of wandering on a road we usually identify only as a grey blur, the woman in the neighbouring car asked Spouse and I if we knew what the trouble might be. Of course we did not have a clue but she gave up hoping we would soon start moving again, stepped out of the car and started to talk to us about where she had come from, where she was going. She asked us if we were going home.
Her young granddaughter poked her head out the window and updated us several times that she had heard a whisper there was an accident, she had heard somebody say we would be trapped for hours.
The chirping child had particularly good ears for picking up the news on the air and her grandmother remarked that the child inside the car knew more than she herself did while standing on the road.
I mentioned to the very friendly lady that we had sausage bread, a fresh trout and a chive plant in the back of our car and joked that at the very least, we would not be hungry.
Our neighbour suggested that it was far better to be at this part of the accident than actually involved in it- a sobering thought which, despite the obvious common sense of it, had not struck Spouse and I until it was said. It made the waiting a good deal easier.
As we stood there, grateful for the sky that held its rain, glad to be safe, the crowd watched as one driver decided that his time was too important: he jumped into his car, drove off the road, dragged the vehicle over the grassy verge between two freeways, almost sank twice in the swamp he had not guessed at, and finally pulled himself out to get back on the road on the other side- not only a completely illegal endeavour but a dangerous and thoughtless one.
As he sped away in the opposite direction we heard a dreadful bang and a clatter; something had gone awfully wrong with the car and no doubt he would pay for his haste.
We were all in the same boat, all having to wait and make the best of it, all wanting to be on our way but not so troubled that we could not make time to share a few comments with fellow travellers otherwise unknown and passing like ships in the night.
After about twenty minutes, one young fellow nearby brought forth a guitar from the back of his car and I am sure that we would have been entertained musically had the word not trickled slowly down that traffic was beginning to flow again.
We all said our goodbyes and made our way onwards, relieved that our precious food would not be spoiled and in some way pleasantly surprised by the encounter and the brief interaction that was so unexpected.