“Whither goest thou, America, in thy shiny car in the night?” —Jack Kerouac

Flashing back through a haring rearing—tearing past the drive-ins out by the airstrip, veering round the bend by the scrub oak and thistle, scaring hogs in the bog by the whistling hayrick, steering up the grade past the shade trees in the yard—to a stop at the start: Pop’s garage.

Moral: One who rushes, from first to last blushes, learns the moral of one’s crushes.

We look at the present through a rear-view mirror. We march backwards into the future —Marshall McLuhan

First crush. Pop teaches a boy to shift for himself. That stick is no toy. In First, what a rush, as Pop’s pride and joy breaches the beeches, stuck as a bump on a log. The teacher hollers like a collarless preacher. A boy’s first blush.

Moral: If in First you don’t leave the yard, what’s a Second for?

You know, I’m cursed with morals. I was raised a certain way. I wish I wasn’t. I wish I was raised by wolves —Carson Daly

Naugahyde, a rush to the touch of tender youth, to be truthful. Behind the codpiece of Pop’s so-lined lux liner lurks young Mr. Hyde. Out by the airstrip, stick in Neutral, uncouth youth revels in revving up the pitch, then jerks the stick into Drive.

Moral: On the wrong side of the strip, in a crushing slide, a jerk in a ditch with tender hide.

About morals, I know only that what is moral is what you feel good after and what is immoral is what you feel bad after —Ernest Hemingway

Pop forgives a jerk by turning a missile over to a musclehead: the hop-back-up-on-whatever-tosses-you-off approach. Out by the airstrip, the rush of its thrust is a crush best forgotten. Just another road hog in a fog, whistling past the drive-ins, whipping like the wind round the bend.

Moral: Whipping wind forgives and forgets, whistles like it couldn’t care less, should scrub oak and thistle reproach a missile or a road hog encroach a bog.

Wisdom, compassion, and courage are the three universally recognized moral qualities of men —Confucius

The Wild One rumbles the American Dream, onscreen at the drive-in out by the airstrip, humble matrons in station wagons scream like teens with a crush on a hunk, when a duck-tailed hound dog’s hot rod smokes its slicks, branding the strip like an outlaw hog on the bunk.

Moral: To stay an outlaw hog in a rush to make an impression with one’s wild obsession, a hayrick’s as good as a bog.

All things will be clear and distinct to the man who does not hurry; haste is blind and improvident –Livy

Thinking small, a harebrained teenager is smitten by a bug. The little engine that could is in the tail. Round the bend, it hugs like a snail. Bites nice on snow. You know it’s imprudent to stomp brakes on ice, though, when the little engine is in the nose, and couldn’t. Pop wins the wager.

Moral: Crush a snail that bites your tail, don’t rush to blame Ralph Nader.

A critic is a man who knows the way but can’t drive the car —Kenneth Tynan

Skaters at the drive-in diner can’t help slamming into a nimrod’s topless babe magnet with their trays. Orange crush and chicken in the bucket seats. Nesting thrushes pick it clean in the yard. At the drive-in movie out by the airstrip, stick in Park, it’s pot luck in Pop’s heavy metal barge.

Moral: A good picture show isn’t the only good reason to rush to a drive-in movie, you know.

To attract men, I wear a perfume called ‘New Car Interior’ —Rita Rudner

Pop’s waxing large in the yard, while a pinhead is still thinking small. Just greased the wheels of a slick little roller in the garage, when, due to a loose nut on the pinhead at the helm, it skates out the door like a greased hog, defacing Pop’s waxed barge. Yet, there is saving grace, in the crushing embrace of an elm.

Moral: South of a garage with a small thinker in charge, a shade tree is good feng shui.

And suddenly I realised that I was no longer driving the car consciously. I was driving it by a kind of instinct, only I was in a different dimension —Ayrton Senna

Funny pop songs on the radio, in the rush hour crush, as the antique roadshow slows to the pace of a marching band, and quick as  Hopalong at a rodeo in Wonderland, the haring bunny stops.

Moral: Slow, steady, the tortoise’s pace wins the race.

How many writers can’t drive? A lot. They’re not practical. They are not capable in everyday life ― Ha Jin