Have you heard about the awful persecution that residents of Highland Park are battling right now?
Jessica Burgess
Clearly Unedited
Officials want to put turn lanes on Mockingbird Lane! Turn lanes! It's just a heartbreaking development, because everyone knows that turn lanes attract the worst kinds of riffraff. I really sympathize. While I don't live in Highland Park, I do live in a very classy neighborhood, too, the kind where the houses EASILY run into the upper $80,000s, and there is a Super Wal-Mart within a convenient distance.
I would be livid if the city wanted to ease the traffic flow on my busy street. Livid!
"But Jessica," you might be wondering, "doesn't it make sense to improve a major artery that connects highways, universities and airports? Surely you don't think that you are exempt from normal public improvements just because your neighborhood has a Super Wal-Mart – which is pretty impressive, I must admit."
First I will chuckle at your naïveté, and now I will school you.
Better traffic flow means more cars, and more cars means more people who can witness and envy my opulent lifestyle. Seeing my expensive and fabulous house from their car might give people notions that they deserve what I have.
Why, they might even scheme to break in and steal my valuable treasures, such as the off-brand iPod docking station, or my 2002 laptop computer.
Look. I appreciate that you want to be able to travel quickly through Dallas. But why not take Interstate 635? It's only eight miles out of the way, and during rush hour, only adds 45 short minutes to your commute. Or just use your helicopter! That's how we folks who live in classy neighborhoods get around.
In fact, the top of the Wal-Mart makes a great helipad.
Jessica used up her entire year's allotment of exclamation points on this one column! E-mail her at jburgess@quickdfw.com.
