CARS

Dorothy Parker’s preferred car was a limousine driven by someone else. But, ah, what she missed by not getting behind the wheel! The freedom of the open road. The tyranny of the balky carburetor. The convenience of getting around. Cars are mythic, iconic and prosaic. In this issue, our writers dive into how the automobile has shaped our lives.

Demon Car
Rebecca Johnson Rebecca Johnson

Demon Car

Word Count 771

When my grandfather bought my mother her first car in 1953, he insisted the dealer remove the radio. Too distracting, he said. This story got passed down in the family as evidence of my grandfather’s personality—generous but, oh my God, SO controlling!

As it happens, all the wrecks I have had in my life occurred because of the radio. The first time, I was 20 years old and driving through the mountains of Bolivia with my two best friends from high school. We had rented a white VW Beetle in Bogota. We were crazy for Mercedes Sosa and those flutey Andean tunes like El Condor no Pasa a.k.a I’d rather be a hammer than a nail. One morning, while driving through a mountain town, I leaned over to take one of those cassettes out of the player and veered right into a parked bus. The side of the Beetle looked like a sardine can had been rolled open.

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