No More Apologies

As a guy who enjoys driving cars, talking about cars, going to car shows, reading car magazines and just generally immersing myself in car stuff, I shouldn’t be surprised that car-related analogies creep into nearly everything I write.  They’re just so darned fitting, you know?  And there’s one for nearly every occasion.

Friends and co-workers enjoy pointing this out to me, because apparently I can’t tell when I’m doing it.  Just yesterday, in fact, when e-mailing a friend about needing some rest, I said I needed to “refill my tank.”  She wrote back, “See?  You’re doing it again.”    Funny how naturally that just happens.

In my professional and social writing, then, I find myself constantly not going with my first instinct when drawing a parallel or making an illustration (saying, for example, that a customer “blew a gasket,” or that a chatty friend “stumbled along like a dieseling engine,” or that a confrontational co-worker should “get out of my grille”), and trying, instead, to replace it with something less grease-stained and more universally understood.  I’m told this will make my writing have broader appeal.

Here in my blog, however, it’s gonna be pedal to the metal.  I’ve just decided.  And I won’t be checking the . . . um . . . rearview mirror to see if I’m leaving anyone in the dust.  You either get it or you don’t.

But I suspect you do get it.  I mean, the automobile is such an ingrained part of our lives that all of us can relate on some level—and probably in more ways than we realize.  Even if all cars did was get us from here to there, they’d still play a big role in our lives:  Not only do we spend an enormous amount of time in them (and resources on them), but they’re the venue for some of the biggest events in our lives—family vacations, poignant father-son discussions, first dates, first kisses, first . . . all kinds of stuff.

As meaningful as it is that we share life with our cars in all of those ways, it’s their power to ignite our imaginations and fire our fantasies that transforms them from mere transport into true transport of the soul.  You may not be fortunate enough to have it in your garage, but out there somewhere—admit it—is a four-wheeled daydream whose shape, sound and power whisper beauty and motion and joy to you in a way few things can.  You may appreciate a beautiful painting or sculpture, but you can’t climb into it and participate.  A scene in nature may give satisfaction, but you can’t take it with you wherever you go.  When a car is particularly involving (which, for me, mandates a manual transmission), the kinship that forms as driver and car work in concert on turn after turn, shift after shift and drive after drive is so sublime that their personalities virtually merge to form what amounts to an avatar for both—a being, if you will, that represents more than either man or machine alone. 

            Sure, we can miss all of this and merely commute; drive on autopilot, all preoccupied and uninvolved.  But sooner or later, the wind and motion and sound call to us, engage us.  It’s no wonder, then, that during these moments of heightened clarity we learn some of life’s greatest lessons—and therefore, in turn, no wonder that cars find their way into our speech.

            So really—can you blame me?