Cars

A glimpse of the dashboard in my dad’s car comes to mind. I am eye to eye with the radio. I’m sitting right next to him. The sun’s shining through the windshield onto my lap. We’re traveling south. My father’s strong hands on the wheel are all that I see.

Sitting in the backseat, I listen as my mom tells my brother to spell the word stupidity. S-t-u-p-i-d-i-t-y. S-t-u-p-i-d-i-t-y. S-t-u-p-i-d-i-t-y. I don’t even know what he did. He was a teenager. I was a little kid. I still spell think of that ride when I spell that word.

I’m by the back door of my mom's car waiting, watching, as raindrops swell until finally they run, making fast tracks down the window. The shadows they make look like leprosy. I find myself bored and fascinated at the same time. My mom is inside the house leaving food for the people who live there. Something bad has happened to them. Food is how you show you care.

On a road trip through the Blue Mountains with my best friend, the radio is playing Bill Withers’ song, “Lean On Me.” We sing along to that and some others. The asphalt was pristine black. The blue-green mountains were food for the eyes. We didn’t need to talk. Sharing hours of silence with someone and knowing that everything’s right with the world is closest you get to feeling like you know who you are.

Buying dinner for the boys we didn’t know in the car behind us at the drive-in window at Taco Bell. Just to see what they would do.

A slide show of meaningful moments drive through my mind.

Cars do more than move people from point A to point B.

—me strauss Letting me be