The Passenger Seat

I found the following note on the back of Chuck Klosterman’s novel “Killing Yourself to Live” and was inspired:

“Sometimes when you’re the co-pilot on a road trip, you’re having such a good time talking to your buddy, gazing out the window, and listening to awesome music that you’re a little reluctant to stop and get out when you actually reach your destination. That’s what reading this book is like.” – Gregory Kirschiling, Entertainment Weekly.

While I can go on about how great of a comment that is for a novel, I immediately thought about the road trips of yesteryear and the beauty of being both the co-pilot and the pilot.

Let’s be honest, the best seat in the car is the seat which controls the music. But having that coupled with being the co-pilot is an amazing surreal feeling.

I have a fresh memory of waking up somewhere between Percé Rock and the border of New Brunswick and Vero was driving. We were passing along the coast and the sun was not quite down but you can see it dipping from its apex. The Beatles were playing. Then we ended up in New Carlisle where my grandmother is from. You know that point of the day where the sun is starting to shine into your windshield and it’s kind of annoying when you’re driving because you can’t really see what the heck is going on outside? In the passenger seat, that’s a totally different experience. It’s like you’re rushing by objects that don’t have much form. The trees hanging across the street bring about this feeling of another world. Like we are traveling through a dream. Maybe it helps that I awoke from a slumber and it’s that point where you don’t want to talk just yet to the driver. You want to hold onto this moment where you are quiet and just stare out the window and pretend to sleep because you want to absorb it all in. That’s the beauty of being the co-pilot. Sometimes you can just exist in the moment but at the same time, you’re passing through the moment.

So the co-pilot position is pretty darn good when the conditions are right…when there is a beauty of the outside world and you are passing along. Like when you have one of those afternoons like when I went up to Hearst and it’s a brisk winter day, but the sun is shining and you’re getting hot in the truck but you still have all your winter clothes on and there isn’t any traffic on the lone highway but you have some gusting wind and the snow is just grazing over the road. You feel like you’re the only person on Earth and you even shut off all the music in the truck just to appreciate the moment you’re in. Those are my favourite winter days. When the sun is shining through some clouds.

iplaying: Live it Out – Metric (Live it Out)