I like driving home from work during Daylight Savings Time because there's so much more daylight. On days I take the interstate, like Friday, even though the skies are grey (it was beautiful Thursday and about 66 degrees Fahrenheit and Friday was more like 51 and crappy. Typical April weather swings.), against a background of clouds, you can see the faint, rosy promise of buds on the branches of trees that line the highway. Soon enough, we'll be worrying about how much the air conditioning in the car lowers the gas mileage, because it's certainly warm enough for air conditioning and we'll have missed that moment when the trees explode.
Speaking of wasted gasoline. Personal (sort of) for the fellow in the early nineties blue long bed Chevy pickup in the supermarket parking lot. I realized you were following me to my car practically from the moment I stepped out of the store. That there were hundreds of empty spaces, but all farther away than mine, was the sole reason you trailed me. And here's a hint: when you're shadowing someone, turn the country music down so that most of it is audible only in your truck (I may have actually been able to hear it inside the store).
That moment where my key fob/door opener didn't seem to work, and I looked around to hear which car was bleating and then 'realized' you were waiting for me and so I gave you a wan smile, pantomimed a look of befuddlement (not that big a stretch anymore) and set off to the far end of the parking lot as I heard you burn rubber letting me know that I'd wasted your time? Yeah, all deliberate. That kind of stuff, the idling in the middle of the lane, the pull-over into the fire lane for ten minutes while your better half grabs the makings of the evening meal, all that razzamatazz gets up my nose. Sorry. but not really.
And then I get gasoline after leaving the market. The station has a relatively small footprint probably unchanged since the late fifties or sixties when it had what looks like might have three service bays and the gas pumps. When everyone is going with the flow, like those credit card commercials, there's enough room for four cars at the four pumps. When an obliviot parks off my driver's side door, eight feet from the pumps, leaves the engine running while he gets out and heads for the convenience mart all the while speaking on his cell phone, all I can do is shake my head.
In an era of three-fifty for regular, Speed Racer is buying cigarettes (I smoked almost three packs a day for twenty-one years, so I understand the addiction. But they weren't almost five bucks or more a pack, back then), and because they are so expensive, he buys them a pack at a time. Transaction complete, as he's leaving the store, he's lighting up and walks between the gas pumps back to his still-running car and off he goes.
The Rights of Man don't mean a damn now in the age of style.
-bill kenny
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