The Open Air

I drove to Charlotte the other day with my boss Harry in his red Mini Cooper convertible. I've never been a car person . . . my interest in cars seems to be significantly less than even the average person, which makes me something of an anti-maven when it comes to vehicles. Just like my relative indifference to food and physical environment, I try to see this as an advantage and a virtue. Just think of all the money I save driving same car for ten years. But I know that, in some weird way, it's just a deficit in my ability to appreciate. Like sports . . . I can go a very long time feeling smug about the fact that I don't give a damn about practically any kind of sport, and thinking that I'm just a superior being to be impervious to such stuff. But then I'll read someone really smart, like Malcolm Gladwell, going on and on about sports, and I'll get that sinking feeling that I'm not superior at all, merely lacking the brain receptor to appreciate such things.

So . . . despite my stoic reserve, a sporty little convertible can still be fun for me. When we got back home, my son Aidan saw the car and said, "Can I ride in it?" And Harry said, "Sure!" and took him for a spin up and down our mountain road. And ask I watched him go wizzing up the road, his hair blowing in the wind and his face alive, I wondered whether something was happening in that moment that will stay with him his whole life.

After Harry drove off, Aidan said, "When am I going to get to ride in a convertible again?" I don't know, Boo-boo, but I have a feeling you'll find a way, someday.