A Note to the Reader
An Online-Only Special from Rob Campbell, Author of Plato's Garage
My initial working title for Platos Garage was The Secret
Life of Cars, but I decided it sounded more like a motorized tribute
to Stevie Wonder than a contemplation of the emotional and metaphysical
congress between man and machine... which reminds me of one of the first
times I was conscious of riding in an automobile.
It was 1969, and my mother had been asked by my nursery school teacher
to come and pick me up because I had coerced a classmate of mine to touch
the steaming wax paper envelope over which the teachers assistant
had just run a hot iron in order to melt the crayon shavings contained
within. This led to much crying and scolding, and apparently I was insubordinate
as well as sadistic. My mother gave it to me when she came to pick me
up.
As we drove home in our 1967 olive green Chevrolet Estate station wagon,
she yelled at me for acting like such a baby (I was expected to be very
cognizant and adult at three years old for some reason). Actually, she
went on and on about it in a sporadically fitful state, complete with
tears and fists pummeling the steering wheel, until her words became an
unintelligible tonal wallpaper. I became aware of two completely unfamiliar
presences that leapt into focus as my mothers voice faded into the
background: Stevie Wonder, and the family car.
Stevie was singing "Ma Cherie Amour" on the radio, and it was the first
time I had ever differentiated one song from the miasma of environmental
sound that squished its way through my toddlers nervous system.
This somehow had something to do with the fact that I also became aware
of the station wagon as a neutral third party in the interaction between
my mother and myself. The smooth forward motion and the dense, satiny
nylon belt across my lap made me feel I was being taken care of by a benevolent
force, which was an entirely new sensation for me at the time.
I soon extrapolated this feeling from cars to all inanimate objects,
and I was convinced that I was surrounded by things that harbored their
own kinds of special life forces. After a while, I took this to a manic
childhood extreme and started apologizing to everything I threw in the
trash, from banana peels to candy wrappers to used tissues. "Im
sorry I have to do this," I would say to my used snot-rag, "but I know
youll be happy here."
"Yes, Ill be happy here," it would answer in a cute, tiny peep,
and Id throw it on top of the rest of the living, breathing garbage.
This turned out to be a phase, but Ive always been fascinated by
the way we imbue the objects around us with character and energy. As I
started to write Platos Garage, I wanted to explore the ways
in which we partner with cars in our own identification and self-transformations.
I did a lot of research in books about cars and "car people," and finally
turned to Gaston Bachelard, an early- to mid-twentieth century French
philosopher who wrote a lot about the animistic world and the ways we
interact with it.
But the book research I did for the essays in Platos Garage
only contributed to their tonal backgrounds, like my mothers voice
in the green station wagon. They are a collection of straightforward,
real-life narratives about myself and a host of other odd characters I
met and interviewed in my search for stories about the mysterious ways
in which people relate to the cars in their lives.
The critic who wrote the book up for the Kirkus Review called
it "intriguing, but a strange trip indeed for those not enslaved to the
automobile," and its true that it portrays an intimacy with the
automobile that people in public transportation-oriented areas might not
share. On a deeper level, though, its a story about the relationship
between man and machine, and the complicated symbiosis that ties the two
together.
Its also the story of a gay mans journey down the freeway
of life, but I think its possible that it transcends its situational
"gayness" and offers stories and observations that ring true to people
of all leanings and tendencies. One reader recently told me he was laughing
out loud through much of it, which is strange, because I dont really
consider myself a comic writer. But I like the idea, and if it makes you
laugh, toogreat!
Rob Campbell
January 11, 2000
Copyright © 2000
Rob Campbell.
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