Chronogram often receives submissions that do not fit into the categories of the magazine—arts and culture, news and politics, et al. Itinerant contributor Patricia Anderson sent us this short but insightful piece below, which we created a category for. —The Editors

I'm sitting at a stop light, alone in my car, listening to the radio, waiting for the light to change. I look over in the lane next to me and there's a woman sitting alone in her car, waiting for the light to change—with tears streaming down her face. She's sitting perfectly still, staring straight ahead, and quietly crying.

So I'm wondering what happened. Maybe she left her husband or lost her job or maybe she's listening to the news and just can't believe how awful it is, or maybe it's a song she's hearing on the radio—a song she used to dance to with a guy she went out with in high school, a guy who was killed in a car crash or who married someone else and broke her heart or made her feel beautiful like no one else has done before or since. Or maybe she's remembering how she wanted to be a singer but wound up working at Wal-Mart and she sees her life slipping away, the life she was going to have, the life she thought would be exciting, would brighten any day now but hadn't, had instead stayed hard and ordinary, was now a life alone, sitting in a car, waiting for the light to change, hearing a song that makes her sad and no one asking why.

Suddenly a whispering came and the god of those who are alone touched her forehead and stroked her cheek and she sighed deeply, her mouth softening and her lips turning up ever so slightly in a sad little smile. Pulling a Kleenex out of her purse she wiped her eyes, blew her nose and drove away.

Okay, that part about the whispering god didn't really happen, but the rest of it did. I saw this woman, sitting alone in her car, crying silently, and I felt for her and I wondered, what will become of us, alone in our cars. What will become of us now that the gods no longer whisper in our ears?
—Patricia Anderson