After 20+ years of walking this Earth as an adult, more or less, I'm finally trying out car ownership. Earlier this month I borrowed my sister's ride to start moving stuff, with the idea that I might end up buying it and joining the millions of fossil fuel abusers nationwide. At this point, I'd say the chances are 50-50 that I'll keep it. Sure, it's convenient. The boys and I can leave the city without racing around catching trains and sweating our six collective nuts off, and when TwoBert wants to bring his four-foot, plush-toy shark along to sleep with, I don't have to contemplate strapping it to my back.
On the minus side, I spend several hours a day wanting to kill everyone.
Don't get me wrong; I love driving and the freedom it brings. But cars also bring out the absolute worst in people--especially in overpopulated, overheated metropoli. Everyone's swerving and speeding and double-parking and eff-youing hither and yon. And then there's the small measure of parking the damned thing. There are about 400 miles of paved streets in Manhattan and 800 miles of cars trying to park on them, and acquiring a space that is safe from the sweeper for a mere 24 hours can transport you into unreasonable bouts of euphoria. You can see them all over town, people pulling into spots and cackling like they just hit the trifecta at Belmont.
Additionally, I've done the following things more in the past week than I've done in the past 10 years:
- Traveled over the George Washington Bridge;
- Listened to "Killer Queen" on FM radio;
- Reflected on how as a kid I was convinced that "Killer Queen" was performed by the Partridge Family.
FM radio has been a salvation, even though it's basically turned into 32% Classic Rock, 65% Yelling, and 3% Other. The boys have taken to rocking out in their car seats, with "Back in Black" and "Walk This Way" at the top of the pops. So if you're cruising along the New Jersey Turnpike and you see a '99 Civic with three handsome heads banging in unison, give us a hollahonk, y'all.
