Inspiration?

[Ghoulish Delight]

Hurtling across the flat, dry, endless expanse of the desert at well over 100 miles per hour, his grin is as wide as the horizon. In the passenger seat, she smiles too, if not as broadly, alternately watching the cracked earth blur beneath the car and turning to watch him.

"What absolute freedom!" he cries, glancing at her for a moment, one eye still on the empty landscape ahead.

"Yes," she responds, "It's amazing." Happy, if a bit dispassionate.

They continue in silence for several miles.

"You checked the brakes, right?" she asks, out of the blue.

"Yes, of course. The brakes are fine."

"Okay, good."

Silence.

"What if they're not?"

"What?"

"What if the brakes don't work?"

"Umm, I guess it doesn't really matter, we have no reason to use them. There's more flat desert here than we'll ever see. I don't plan to stop until the car runs outta gas and we coast to a stop."

"I know, I know."

Looking out the window, her smile fades. It returns for a moment when her gaze shifts back to him, still grinning ear to ear. But it doesn't last.

"But what if something gets in the way?"

"What? Nothing's going to get in the way. Besides, if it does, we have the brakes."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, I told you I checked them. We wouldn't have started if we didn't have brakes. But it doesn't matter, we won't need them."

"But what if we do?"

"But we don't. And even if we did, they're fine."

"How can you be sure?"

"I checked them."

"That was 20 miles ago. Maybe something's happened to them. I think we should stop."

"What?! But that makes no sense! If what makes you want to stop is the possibility of lack of brakes, then all stopping will do is prove that we didn't need to stop."

"...."

He laughs, and pats her leg reassuringly. And continues driving.

"What was that!?" she exclaims, gripping his arm and making the car waver for a moment.

"What was what?"

"I...there was a big ditch or something, we narrowly missed it, why didn't you stop?"

"There was? I didn't see it. And we didn't hit it. That's why I didn't stop."

"But we could have..."

"Could have, but we didn't."

Her smile is gone now. She puts it on the few times he looks her way.

"I think I saw another hole or bump or something," she says quietly, weakly.

"Fvck, do you want to stop?"

"No, I just...I don't know."

"Because we'll stop if you want."

"No. No. I'm fine."

The desert is endless, and she does feel like it can go on forever, only stopping when the car "naturally" runs out of gas. But she's watching. She's watching the ground ahead to look for flaws, rather than the beauty of the ground disappearing underneath them. And she's watching him drive, scrutinizing, making sure he doesn't screw up, making sure he's watching for the hazards too.

They've reached a slight downgrade, the car begins to pick up speed, tires skimming gracefully over the baked desert landscape. He's stopped turning even one eye towards her.

"Stop," she says, suddenly and matter-of-factly. "I'm not enjoying this anymore."

He looks briefly, directly into her eyes, and then puts his foot on the brakes.

The car groans in protest, the tires, so recently content with barely contacting the ground, scramble for purchase on the thin layer of dust that coats the earth, and the car begins to spin. Both occupants thrown violently to one side, their seatbelts saving them from major damage. After what seems like an agonizingly long time, the car comes to a rest, the engine voices a few last spiteful whines and clanks, and dies in a way that lets them know it's not going to start again.

She sits in the passenger seat, head hanging.

The car, after a couple spins, has come to rest facing back in the direction they had come. He's staring wide-eyed out the window at the tracks that they've left.

"I'm sorry," she sobs. "There was no good reason to stop."

He's quiet for a moment. Then looks at her. "I...I didn't know it would be so difficult to stop. I wonder if we even could have stopped in time or safely to avoid anything that got in our way."

They sit in silence for an eternity.

"Do you wish we were still going?" he asks.

"Yes. I do."

"So do I. If we repair the engine, should we try again?"

"I don't know."

"Neither do I."

[Cadaverous Pallor]

My God....you guys continue to amaze me....and I've been totally blanking on this one. Eliza did a fantastic job of the fully-fleshed debate....€ brought it down to bare essence....and I'll tell GD what I think of his in private.

I need to work on this...

[Boss Radio]

Apparently my mojo machine doesn't give the love to the usual suspects, so I'll just do the call out:
Eliza is brilliant as always.
Euro - bravo! Love the philosophical poem. If Linus were to leap out of the Peanuts strip and take the form of a half-mad beatnik with a Disney jones, I imagine he would be you.
GD - I am very impressed. You are a triple threat.

You people are all so very talented.

Makes me feel like...dancing.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Triple threat? What are the other two? Heck, what's the first one?

[Boss Radio]

Where as the great Sammy Davis Jr. was a triple threat because he could:
1. Dance
2. Sing
3. Tell jokes and do impressions

GD is a triple threat because he is:

1. A highly intelligent and witty conversationalist.
2. An excellent writer.
3. A technical super genius whiz kid.

Dude, accept it. Your a trriple threat.
Don't go all ego, now...

[Cadaverous Pallor]

He's got other talents as well.

[Not Afraid]

Originally Posted by Boss Radio

Don't go all ego, now...

D'oh!

[Ghoulish Delight]

For the record, I need to give credit where credit is due for my piece. The underlying debate was mine, the story was mine, but the car analogy was all CP. A brilliant analogy without which I wouldn't have been able to verbalize my thoughts.

[Boss Radio]

So you're really Ellery Queen.

[blueerica]

I've been putting off posting or writing anything about Logic vs. Emotion, because it's hitting really close to home right now. I've tried to avoid talking about it too much on the boards, though recently it has seeped out into some things I've posted. Stuff is still in a legal sense pending, and it's probably just not right to talk about it. As I type this, I have 4 police officers (that reads at 2 LAPD cruisers sitting in front of my house) in the back, talking to a former tenant who has lost all reason, all sensibility, and apparently, his sanity.

We've been dealing with this for months, and while there have been mis-steps on our end, for the most part we've been screwed at every turn. This guy has exhausted every opportunity, every loophole, every goddamn little thing to weasel his way back in. When I was home alone last week, the lock-out occurred. For anyone who's been involved with the process, you know that the lock-out is usually the end of the line. Usually. So, I guess he broke back in and squatted for 3 days, but I didn't know about that until Friday, after I discovered an unwelcome mat waiting outside his apartment, as I was going up to feed his fish. Poor fish.

Oh, I should tell you, an unwelcome mat is a bed of nails screwed into the platform in front of his door.

So, after a while of the cops talking to him, trying to talk him down, getting him to undo the barricades from behind the door, and off the windows, the tenant throwing papers out the backside of his apartment, the kind officer I was dealing with nicely decided to talk me into letting him have until Sunday morning to move his belongings out, since the former tenant was so concerned. So, here comes Monday morning, and the police are back. It's all locked up again. Nothing has been moved. The tenant pretended to move from Friday to Monday. Not logical, I'll tell you that much.

So today, he's been given another (I skipped half the story because I don't wanna spend all day typing, and I probably have to talk to the cops at some point soon) 15 minutes. Which turned into an hour. Which turned into 3 hours. Which brings me to now, and I'm kinda hungry.

Grandma's gone racist. 3 birds died, 1 fish. Lots of dog poop. Mom at the doctors all the time, and we don't know what's wrong. My little 13 year old sisters are flipping me off. Had to buy new car keys, and wow are they expensive. Need new rear brakes. FAFSA hasn't gotten back to me, and I want money for school.

But, when all is said and done, my life is good. I have these problems to worry about. No matter what happens in this, I know that I have been through and survived worse. I'm in the top percentages of having a good life in this world. I am not in a war. I am not being beaten about the head. I've got food in the refrigerator. I have a car to drive. I have a job. I'm going to school. I have friends. I have family that loves me. I love my family. I'm not dying. Or at least I'm not dying soon, unless you're counting the % chance that I could die in the next 30 minutes. Hell, I'm on the internet posting about this, and someone's reading it, whether they care or not. My life is fvcking good, and that's about as logical and as emotional as it gets. I'm in a good place.

So, CP, I'm putting in a request. When you choose the next inspiration, don't pick something so close to home. I want to write for an escape.