Science Fiction is Now, But Cars Are Still Ugly

If you follow my personal blog, Writer, Writer, Pants on Fire, you know that I recently lost an entire outbuilding to a massive storm. Shortly thereafter the transmission burnt out on my car and I was starting to feel like a female Charlie Brown. It’s time for a new chicken-coop, and a new car. The science fiction aspect is definitely more applicable to the car than the chickens.

First of all, I dislike cars – and not for the reasons you think. Yes, I love nature. Yes, I like animals. People are OK. Cars manage to kill all these things. But that’s not why I don’t like them.

I don’t like cars because they’re so damn boring.

They all look like… cars. Even the cars with an ultra-modern design seem to be having an identity crisis. Are you an SUV? Are you a car? Are you a station wagon? Are you a truck? So many of the models I’ve been looking at as I shop don’t really seem to know. They’re like, Check me out, I’m ALL these things, and you can be too!

Well, I don’t want to be. I want a vehicle that’s confident in the fact that it’s a mini-van, or an SUV, or a truck. Just BE that thing, man. I drove a PT Cruiser for a decade because I liked that it was reminiscent of 1940’s cars. It was funky, and different from every other box on wheels.

I still don’t know what I want, and am waiting patiently to fall in love. In the meantime, I’m driving my parent’s Lincoln Navigator *cough* bus *cough* and am making lists of pros and cons.

And here’s the thing – despite the fact that I pretty much hate everything I see, I’m uniformly impressed by the technology in all of them. My car knows where I am, and can get me somewhere else. My car tells me when it needs oil, or the tire pressure is off. Cars can show you what’s behind you so that you don’t back into another car, an animal, a tree… or a person. It can call 911 for you if it feels that is necessary, save your life with an inflatable balloon, and auto-brake if a kid dashes into the road.

And most impressive- I can talk to my car. I tell it what to do, and it’s all, “Yeah, got it.”

What the hell? I mean, seriously – when I bought my Cruiser I was super excited because it was the first car I owned that had a CD player. My new car doesn’t even need a CD player. I tell it what I want to listen to, it confers with the phone, and they provide me with music. I’m impressed.

I know this is old news to everyone else. Yes, cars are cool and do awesome things, Mindy, you’re probably thinking. But this girl hasn’t bought a car in ten years, and a lot has changed since then. It makes me wonder what cars will be like in another ten years.

You know what I want? A car that cooks me supper for me.