DocAndersen
As I thought of these things, I drew aside the curtains and looked out into the darkness, and it seemed to my troubled fancy that all those little points of light filling the sky were the furnaces of innumerable divine alchemists, who labour continually, turning lead into gold, weariness into ecstasy, bodies into souls, the darkness into God; and at their perfect labour my mortality grew heavy, and I cried out, as so many dreamers and men of letters in our age have cried, for the birth of that elaborate spiritual beauty which could alone uplift souls weighted with so many dreams.
William Butler Yeats
Quotes are something that allows us to share the thoughts of others. Today, the four of five cars I’ve shared in the Car Crazy Challenge. I won’t talk about cars other than to mention stories of vehicles in my life. I have so many memories of vehicles. For the first sixteen years of my lie, I dreamed of cars. I drove a Woodie Station wagon at my grandfather’s house when I was 12. It was my first driving experience. My grandfather took me to the unplowed snow-covered parking lot to teach me how to drive in snow. My dad drove me to the football stadium parking lot in Bloomington, Indiana, so I could learn to drive. A huge piece of me as a driver came from those two people teaching me.
When I was 14 or 15, and the first learner’s permit was achieved, the car meant freedom. I was not bound to my parent’s house. Funny, now, everyone is attached to a home. But then each car was freedom—the wind in your hair. Turn on the radio, something my father never did, feel the wind on your face, and just drive. When I was little in the days of cheaper gasoline, we would go for country drives on Sundays. We would wander around Southern Indiana, finding interesting places. I suspect we didn’t do that in Chicago, living near Washington DC now, I can tell you that even on the weekends, even in a pandemic lockdown, traffic is pretty much always bad!
Then there was the second transition from freedom to the job. Where the car represented no longer the freedom (but the radio was still on), but now was my way to get to work. Transportaiton became the model of the car. I no longer saw the vehicle as freedom. Now the car was the path to get from where I was to where I had to be. Had to be, no more extended school but now my life. The last transition for me was responsibility. When my kids started to drive, it changed everything. I was no longer just driving to work. Now I suddenly had to worry about my kids driving. Now it is about my kids being at risk as they got behind the wheel of a car and drove somewhere. They may have felt the freedom I once did, but for me now, I couldn’t see freedom.
