While I'm thankful to be on the receiving end of a new "lesson-in-life" just about every day, let me make a feeble attempt to pass one along, myself. My analogy stinks, but hey ... I said it would be feeble.

Here's the deal. I was in a State Government office the other morning, early, when one of the program analysts came in about twenty-minutes before she usually gets there. Now this is a lady who is NEVER early. Never late, either ... but more than ten-seconds early is cause for alarm ... you know what I mean.

She looked in complete disarray. Her hair was wet, and no, it hadn't been raining. As she came in the door, she was finishing tying off a fashionable scarf around her neck, and her face, which normally sports a very light, yet stylish amount of makeup was ... well, make-up-less. Very strange.

I asked if she was OK, and to my amazement she said, flatly: "No! They finally opened the new highway (a project in the making for five years), and I didn't have the red lights to dry my hair and get ready for work!!"

Interesting, I thought. Here's a person complaining about NO RED LIGHTS ... which got me to thinking (a dangerous notion) ... that she's absolutely right!!

I don't think we realize it - I certainly don't - but we really do need life's occasional "red lights" -- momentary breaks in the action to "put on the makeup" or get a gameplan together, if you will. Sometimes, life's super-highways get us there just a bit early, when in reality, the old fashioned four-way stop sign lets everyone take stock ... and then proceed.

And so endeth the lesson ... but speaking of red lights, here's a sequel to last week's Fortnight:

Obviously I opted for the extension ... but, hey, what did I say? A self-imposed "red light" now and again ain't all that bad, eh?