I have never been more depressed in my entire life. After the drive home on Wednesday, I had already spent over the equivalent time of a standard work day in my car. At the end of the month, I had spent well over a work week's worth of hours commuting.
That is time you don't get back, and it is near impossible to use it for anything worth while if you're stuck driving. Audiobooks helped _a little_ some weekly podcasts made some days better than others, but on the whole, it was just 3 hours of bored raging every day.
When you're finally home, you've got about enough time to cook, say hello to the family, and then nip off to bed because you've gotta wake up before dawn to beat the bulk of the traffic. It was such a fucking grind.
Never again. I'll happily trade 10s of thousands of dollars off any potential salary to not endure traffic again.