Here with me.
Why do Americans drive? Why the obsession with being on the road? When global warming is no longer the ugly neighbor down the street who gives us the creeps when we pass them on the walk home but has become instead the scary burglar beating down our door with a tire-iron, why do we insist on clinging to this self-indulgent mode of transportation?
Because a car is a place to be alone. When you are in a car, by yourself, you're starring in your own private movie, and the scene is the dramatic introspective montage. A car is a place to be alone with your thoughts, to shut away the outside world, to exist in a transitory state that's at once freeing and isolating. You're alone. You have the freedom, if you truly wanted to, to simply leave and not come back. And the combination can be intoxicating.
When you're alone in the car everything that's been percolating through the back of your subconscious rises to the front of your mind and presents itself for your perusal as the scenery flits by out the window. If you're like me, you like to drive in the evenings or early in the morning, when it's quiet and cool and the world feels like it's only half paying attention to you, and no one much is on the road. And you like to drive with your windows down, so you can feel the night (or morning) air. I do a lot of my best thinking in the car. It filters out my brain, so to speak. And perhaps not for all of you, but for me, my car is one of the few places where I can feel truly alone when I need to--even though that's really an illusion, to a degree.
I kind of wonder if Americans' obsession wih driving, completely aside with it being tied into our attitudes (illusions...) of freedom, has anything to do with our cult of celebrity. We're certainly not alone in our ritual of idol-worship (United Kingdom, I'm looking at you) but I have a funny feeling that the skewed vision of our one-way glass, our view into the lives' of celebrities, gets at least a healthy dose of life from how powerful it is to hear a particular song alone in a car, especially when you're in an emotionally vulnerable mood. It's so easy to lull yourself into feeling kinship with someone you've never met, to secretly think that they are singing to you, that no one except you resonates as powerfully with this line of music, that this singer, this band---they understand you--when you are behind the wheel of your car. I hear you, I know you, I'm singing this for you because we have a connection...I'm here for you. It's a lie, but a sweet one.
Sometimes I need that lie. I bet I'm not the only one. I know that going for a drive when I'm restless or anxious can help ease my mind, that belting song lyrics anonymously out the window to an uncaring, distracted cityscape can make me feel better than brooding in my room. It can make me feel better about the weighty, sinking realization that no matter how close you are to someone, no matter how much you love them, that no one experiences anything quite the same way you do, and that you are ultimately alone.
I don't know where I'm going with this. There's some ironic joke in here, some kind of sarcastically deeper meaning, but I can't find it right now.
Because a car is a place to be alone. When you are in a car, by yourself, you're starring in your own private movie, and the scene is the dramatic introspective montage. A car is a place to be alone with your thoughts, to shut away the outside world, to exist in a transitory state that's at once freeing and isolating. You're alone. You have the freedom, if you truly wanted to, to simply leave and not come back. And the combination can be intoxicating.
When you're alone in the car everything that's been percolating through the back of your subconscious rises to the front of your mind and presents itself for your perusal as the scenery flits by out the window. If you're like me, you like to drive in the evenings or early in the morning, when it's quiet and cool and the world feels like it's only half paying attention to you, and no one much is on the road. And you like to drive with your windows down, so you can feel the night (or morning) air. I do a lot of my best thinking in the car. It filters out my brain, so to speak. And perhaps not for all of you, but for me, my car is one of the few places where I can feel truly alone when I need to--even though that's really an illusion, to a degree.
I kind of wonder if Americans' obsession wih driving, completely aside with it being tied into our attitudes (illusions...) of freedom, has anything to do with our cult of celebrity. We're certainly not alone in our ritual of idol-worship (United Kingdom, I'm looking at you) but I have a funny feeling that the skewed vision of our one-way glass, our view into the lives' of celebrities, gets at least a healthy dose of life from how powerful it is to hear a particular song alone in a car, especially when you're in an emotionally vulnerable mood. It's so easy to lull yourself into feeling kinship with someone you've never met, to secretly think that they are singing to you, that no one except you resonates as powerfully with this line of music, that this singer, this band---they understand you--when you are behind the wheel of your car. I hear you, I know you, I'm singing this for you because we have a connection...I'm here for you. It's a lie, but a sweet one.
Sometimes I need that lie. I bet I'm not the only one. I know that going for a drive when I'm restless or anxious can help ease my mind, that belting song lyrics anonymously out the window to an uncaring, distracted cityscape can make me feel better than brooding in my room. It can make me feel better about the weighty, sinking realization that no matter how close you are to someone, no matter how much you love them, that no one experiences anything quite the same way you do, and that you are ultimately alone.
I don't know where I'm going with this. There's some ironic joke in here, some kind of sarcastically deeper meaning, but I can't find it right now.