And it was so nice. My dad had had "Business Cars" while I was growing up and they were nice but the green Bonneville was the first new car my parents bought just for us, no give-backs, just for us. I don't even know if it was new new or just new to us, but it had fog lights that might as well been Hover gear; they were so fancy I used to pray for fog. And somewhere in the back rooms of my mind I have this clear moment of driving down a hill in Orem, the one that Jarom Roland lived on, and I was in the car by myself and my fingers and toes vibrated with independence. It was night time and I had no where to go but I had the car and I was 16 and I was going to drive.
My dad tells the story of driving over the Point of the Mountain and he was listening to classical music, something I quietly mocked at the time he was telling this story but now I replicate, and he was getting so into the music he started leading the music with his right arm...then his left...then, so he could see his orchestra, he closed his eyes but just for a bit. When he opened them he saw a hitchhiker on the side of the road (of which my Father was still on, luckily for the hitchhiker). My dad was at a crucial moment in the movement but, to hear him tell it, even though he was doing 55 in a tan Ford Tempo, he met eyes with the hitchhiker and the hitchhiker with him. And, of the two, it was the hitchhiker who put his arms down. He would brave the elements and walk rather than get in the car with the man who's just messed his hair up so his first chair oboist would take him seriously.
Once, in a perfect "Wonder Years" moment, three friends and I were driving in Adam's Dad's burgundy Mercedes with tan leather interior and a CD player, the first one I'd ever seen in a car. As we drove up some canyon road he put in a CD and then my life was different. Her name was Holly Cole (and still is) and she was my grown up music. Anyone will tell you I have horrible taste in music. Lindsay was so cool (and still is) when I met her and she would take me to concerts and clubs with live bands and it was baffling. "How did all these people know to come here? How did they know the name of this band? and How are they all singing along?" It's been a long time since she's gone to see a live band that she heard of while pirating music off Napster. But, in exchange, I have given her Holly Cole and now I give her to you. She's smokey and cool and has the ability to make a 17-year-old look out at a night sky through a passenger window and feel like he's real and different and has something to give back to the world, even if it was only ever her.
Ladies and Gentlemen...
Holly Cole
Holly Cole
