If you are at all familiar with city living, then you know that traffic is an issue. Here in the metropolitan DC area, traffic is a nightmare. And we’re talking horror movie nightmares not “I had a scary dream” nightmare.

I’ve come across many people who are surprised to find out how awful traffic can be. One client told me that she moved here from southern Georgia. For the first year of her assignment, she was late. She told me that when you live down south, if your destination is 30 miles away, it will take you 30 minutes. That is not the case in our Northern Virginia area. Out here, traffic issues can make a 3-mile trip take 30 minutes.

Such was the case for me on Friday. My youngest needed a ride to the airport. Reagan National is 13 miles away from my house. It took me about 35 minutes to get out there. On a Friday evening, that’s not bad. I was able to get her to ticketing by 5:00pm. When I was ready to leave, I checked my driving app to see which was the best way to go home. Sure enough, it was to reverse my drive. So I set off.

Traffic on the Inner Loop of the Beltway (I-395 for those not in the know) was congested but moving. “All right, app” I thought, “you are correct.” I got off on my exit and proceeded to the main road that would take me home. As I turned the corner, I found myself in a dead stop.

My first thought was “accident”. Just last month my husband had taken the same route and was stuck because of a horrible incident. So I waited. I listened to various local radio shows so I could hear the traffic report. Nothing. I tuned into a station that only does “Weather, Traffic and News”. Still nothing. I was confused.

A half an hour later, I still hadn’t moved much farther than 400 feet.

As I finally was able to progress through an intersection, I noticed that cars were blocking the box. People were going into on-coming traffic lanes just to get across the intersection. Amazing.

An hour later, I had inched my way to the problem area. Construction crews had reduced three lanes down to one over a bridge. Of course, no one was working-it was 6:30 in the evening! Incredible!

My husband always laughs at me when I say how much I love living in the DMV (DC, Maryland, Virginia). I remind him that I love the culture, the music and the experiences available while living here. I HATE traffic. Friday just reinforced my belief. I need to be rich enough to have my own personal helicopter.