Saturday, December 24, 2005

Edit The Sad Parts

Sometimes all I really wanna feel is love,
Sometimes I'm angry that I feel so angry.

Sometimes my feelings get in the way

Of what I really feel I needed to say.


My toes tickle the accelerator through my old leather shoes just enough to maintain a reasonable distance behind the red late-model Pontiac forging through ahead of me. Fist on my chin, wind buffetting the canvas top, road irregularities jarring the stiff double-wishbone suspension, I peer out the window over the acres of farmland as my tiny Honda barrels down Highway 25 on this early December evening. Orderly telephone poles frame a lonely windmill lazily spinning away - in a blink, it disappears from view. The fog is unusually thick today, concealing the edges of the southern Gilroy valley. Without the mountains to frame my view, I imagine the valley floor to stretch to eternity...

Sure, it's cheaper to fly.
It takes less time.
And you don't arrive tired.
...But I still prefer driving.

I've ran this eight hour 540 mile San Francisco-to-San Diego-express countless times since I've made The Bay my new home and yet I still don't tire of it. [Heh...years ago I remember going for broke late one night and clocked an outrageous 6.25 hour E.T. Partly because I was desperately trying to stay awake, and partly because I wanted to see if I could do it.] Call it antisocial, call it loneliness. Call it whatever the heck you want to call it... I have this strange fascination with driving. I think it's because time in the car is an opportunity for my mind to relax as it churns away on some notion, set to the backdrop of an exceedingly eclectic choice in music.

You know, I wonder how different of a person I would be if I could take all those hours spent sitting on my ass in the car daydreaming, and used the time to do something constructive. Heck, how different would this world be if no one had to spend any time in the car commuting/driving?

Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]

3 Comments:

At 12/29/2005 10:23 AM, Blogger laragitara said...

You know, I wonder how different of a person I would be if I could take all those hours spent sitting on my ass in the car daydreaming, and used the time to do something constructive. Heck, how different would this world be if no one had to spend any time in the car commuting/driving?

Very different i'd imagine. Better not calculate exactly how much of our lives (in hours, days) went to commuting instead of "living".

 
At 12/29/2005 10:48 AM, Blogger VirtualErn said...

Seeing as how you've piqued my curiousity, I'm going to not heed your advice :)

...I average ~30K miles per year. I'm going to ballpark average speed to be 35mph.

That means I spend ~857 hours on the road/year --> 35 days --> a little over 1 month each year.

Damn. 1 month...
I could write a book.
Or learn a foreign language.
Learn how to dance.
Take singing lessons.
Backpack through Europe.
Eat at every restaurant on Clement St.

Well, maybe not.

 
At 12/29/2005 1:29 PM, Blogger laragitara said...

a whole month...
wow!

 

Post a Comment

<< Home