The Periphery of the Mind

The Professor was going to a business conference in Dallas, a horrible wretched city where everyone drove in cars powered by spite. Seriously, you can look it up. If you spend enough time in a city, you learn what makes it unique. Kansas City is an exercise in chaos and abstract city design. Fayetteville is an arrogant little town, clinging to past memories as it tries to deny its dwindling relevance. Springfield is an uncertain place, not sure what it wants to do or how it'll get there. And Dallas just flat out hates driving, and hates you.

Drivers in Dallas are some of the rudest, most inconsiderate mammals to walk erect to motorized vehicles that free them from the burden of walking erect. But it's not the fault of the people of Dallas, not entirely. Their roads and highways and interstates and streets work upon their collective psyche the way a prison or asylum turns an otherwise normal person into a hardened felon or a life-long inmate. Driving in Dallas turns you mean, makes you hard, so that you can survive it. All sane people know "don't go to Dallas"; they know the roads are exercises in madness and despair. So of course, when the Professor gave me the ultimatum of playing navigator or sending her into the city of Dis alone, I reluctantly agreed.

Labels: Scribblings, The Spring of 2009