High speed highways these days are designed and built with a narrow corrugated strip of pavementy outside the driving lane. It’s sometimes called "the rumble strip" because that’s what it sounds like when a distracted driver allows her vehicle to veer off the roadway. It’s also sometimes called "the wake up strip" to describe its effect upon a dozing driver who lets his car drift across that built-in noisemaker.
In some states, that teeth-chattering strip is immediately outside the white line marking the outside of the driving lane. Other states leave a narrow area of smooth pavement between the white line and that jarring strip of corduroy asphalt.
After many years of drifting back and forth across the painted outer limit of the driving lane, I have come to call that small smooth area outside the white line "the grace strip." Without that strip of "grace," I am immediately "punished" for my "sin" of inaccurate steering by the raucous noise and unsettling vibrations of that hidden highway "hell." That little "grace strip," on the other hand, gives me time to "repent" of my "sins" and correct my course before the "punishment" of the rumble strip sets my nerves on edge and distracts me even worse!
Thank God for grace – on the highway, and all along my pathway through life!
