People Are Complicated. So Are Bridges.

In a message by Dr. Earl Palmer, he used the Golden Gate Bridge to illustrate a basic truth about life. He said that the “secret” of this monumental bridge’s strength and stability depends on two main cables. These cables he compared to simplicity and flexibility.

It still amazes me when a situation triggers memory of an illustration I heard a long, long time ago. While seeking simplicity, my life still gets complicated.

The design of this “eighth wonder of the world in Northern California” does not depend on hundreds of cables strung all over the bay area like a web. Instead, 2 main cables anchored in bedrock on each side of the bay support “this beloved international icon and true engineering marvel that carries about 40 million vehicles a year.” [1]

Emotions surrounding a complicated situation reminded me of the simplicity/flexibility analogy, making me curious about the Golden Gate Bridge.

A Few Facts to Consider

The Golden Gate Bridge website calls it “a symbol of American ingenuity and resolve. Considering that the bridge was built during the Great Depression, who can argue?

Joseph B. Strauss, credited as chief engineer, said, “A great city with water barriers and no bridges is like a skyscraper with no elevators. Bridges are a monument to progress.” [2]

Yet monumental obstacles lay between the bridge’s conception and construction.

Strauss also said, “It took two decades and two hundred million words to convince people the bridge was feasible.”

Building the bridge required not only calculations of projected costs, but “computations of stresses” the bridge would have to support, and decisions about employing architects, engineers, geologists, contracts for builders––teams of experts in each field.

“The bridge would be two-and-one-half times larger than any similar bridge in the world. The towers would be 10 feet higher than the Eiffel Tower.”

The official construction started January 5, 1933, and “The Last Rivet Ceremony” took place on April 27, 1937.

On May 27, 1937, when the bridge opened to pedestrian traffic, San Francisco Chronicle reporter Will O’Brien wrote, “A necklace of surpassing beauty was placed about the lovely throat of San Francisco yesterday.” The next day, the bridge opened to vehicle traffic “ahead of schedule and under budget.”

February 22, 1985, the one billionth car crossed the bridge. And in March of 2020, bridge traffic dropped 70% because of the pandemic shelter in place order.

If only the bridge could tell its own stories.

Bridge Features

Two main cables pass over the two 746-foot tall towers, secured in giant anchorages at either end. Spinning these cable wires that are 36 3/8inches diameter took 6 months and 9 days. The length of galvanized steel wire used to make these main cables: 80,000 miles, with 61 bundles of steel in each wire. The weight of the two cables and accessories: 24,500 tons.

Cable bands, suspender ropes, and the concrete account for additional components of construction.

So much for the Simplicity Illustration

While true that the Golden Gate bridge connects to two main cables, appearing simple yet sturdy, the cables themselves are complicated engineering feats of enduring value and support. People trust that bridge with their lives every time they cross from San Francisco to Marin County.

Who or what do I trust to support my life? Is that answer simple or complicated?

My husband tells me I can complicate a rock fight. His comment reminds me that simplifying problems rather than complicating them makes it easier to find solutions.

While trying to unwind weaknesses noted in another person’s life, I thought about how I complicate my own life through comparisons, competition, and concern for things I cannot fix.

When it comes to other people’s problems, people like me have a problem thinking about solutions to other people’s problems when I cannot even fix what’s wrong with me.

“Dear Sir: Regarding your article ‘What’s Wrong with the World?’ I am.

Yours truly, G.K. Chesterton”

Lately, I’m discovering that unraveling other people’s problems would be a lot like trying to unwind the steel cables in the Golden Gate Bridge. Complicated.

The fixers of the world get proficient at suggesting what would work for someone else while concealing or minimizing their own weaknesses and problems. Easy to make solutions sound simple.

Solutions look easy from a distance––like looking through the wrong end of a telescope––trying to formulate advice for someone else’s life.

Only, this does not work. Ever.

Fixing people problems isn’t simple because people are complicated. Like the steel strands that combine to make the bridge’s main cables of support, people make innumerable choices; then our choices make us.

Flexibility and Singing in the Wind

Amidst storms, relentless ocean waters that beat against its towers, continuous traffic and the weight of the bridge itself, by design, the Golden Gate Bridge holds up under pressure because the cables attach to bedrock on both ends.

Prayers concerning some of the burdens people must carry for their choices alters my perspective, alleviates stress, reduces anxiety, and lifts the weight of comparisons God never intended that I make.

flexibility–characterized by a ready capability to adapt to new, different, or changing requirements

Each and every week, I step into new opportunities to exercise flexibility amidst complicated people problems.

Like the Golden Gate Bridge, staying anchored on both ends (to heaven and earth), cables of faith and flexibility allow me to sway with the winds that blow. I read that sometimes people hear the bridge sing during high winds.

By taking a long view of God’s purposes working through other people’s problems, as well as my own, sometimes God gives me the grace to “sing in the wind.” [3]

[1] golden gate.org; unless otherwise noted, information cited here came from this website.

[2] 1931 radio address

[3] Golden Gate Bridge sings during high winds. On Friday, June 5, 2020, many people on and around the Bridge heard a humming sound coming from the Golden Gate Bridge. The sound is the result of sustained high winds coming from the northwest and passing at a specific angle through the recently installed new west sidewalk Bridge railing.