{"id":132,"date":"2010-07-23T02:27:00","date_gmt":"2010-07-23T02:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nosmallthing.net\/main\/?p=132"},"modified":"2021-05-08T14:37:33","modified_gmt":"2021-05-08T14:37:33","slug":"view-from-the-back-seat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nosmallthing.net\/main\/view-from-the-back-seat\/","title":{"rendered":"View from the Back Seat"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The other night, I agreed to go out with a new friend to partake in his circle\u2019s longstanding tradition of Red Beans \u2018n Rice Mondays. I love Cajun cooking, swamp inspired two-steps, and almost any good excuse to hang out in a welcoming kitchen sharing wine, opinionating about recent columns in the New York Times, and swapping stories about things we\u2019ll probably never do again, but are glad we did that one time.<\/p>\n

When he picked me up, he explained that his daughter Zoe would be driving to his friend\u2019s three flat located less than two miles away. I was then instructed to \u2013 excuse the junk (and there\u2019s always junk, right?) — slide into the back seat.<\/p>\n

Wow. This was different, I thought. I couldn\u2019t remember the last time I had looked at a driver\u2019s side headrest from this vantage point. I felt a little disoriented. Ah, there\u2019s the seat belt. I noticed the seat belts in the back came out of the crease between the back cushions and bench instead of from the door as it does in the front.<\/p>\n

I really couldn\u2019t say much. I couldn\u2019t tell Zoe when to flash her turn signals. That was her father\u2019s job. I couldn\u2019t change the radio station. Too far to reach. Also too far to reach, there\u2019d be no purpose in trying to re-direct the vent. The air it\u2019s supposed to divert probably wouldn\u2019t find me way back here anyway.<\/p>\n

Backseats, I mused, were reserved for kids and old people. I remembered backseat pastimes I used to play during family road trips when I was growing up, looking out the window to count the number of red cars on the way to the cottage or raising my arm, hand balled into a fist, and pumping it up and down until I could get a trucker to honk his horn. And being carted around when I get old, when I get too near-sighted or too hampered by shoulder pain to steer with authority (And Lord, take away my keys when my judgment fails), I didn\u2019t want to think about this.<\/p>\n

Okay, the back seat view is not exclusive to eight year-olds and octogenarians. I remembered that wealthy people sit in the back seat when chauffeured around, and taxi rides usually involve this view, but neither thoughts dispelled my notion that sitting in the back seat was an exercise in losing control.<\/p>\n

Did Terragusto close down?<\/p>\n

We passed a wonderful neighborhood Italian restaurant where I noticed the lights were off. Oh yes, I remembered with relief, they\u2019re not out of business. They\u2019re just closed on Mondays.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we might need a parking permit when we get to your friend\u2019s house,\u201d I echoed quietly, having just observed parking signs along the route that I might not have noticed from the driver\u2019s seat.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s the Tiny Lounge, I said to myself, spying the local haven for martini aficionados, and the Southport Grocery and Caf\u00e9, famous for their vanilla butter cream frosted cupcakes. The awning bearing its name was tucked in between other buildings and could have easily been missed. I\u2019ve always wanted to check these places out. Hmm. A large CVS sign. I think this pharmacy is open 24 hours. Without needing to focus my attention on the white Camry changing lanes too often, I noticed several under the radar landmarks in my neighborhood as if for the first time.<\/p>\n

Sitting in the back seat, relaxing and enjoying the ride is no small thing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The other night, I agreed to go out with a new friend to partake in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","grateful-dozen-musings-imaginings"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nView from the Back Seat – No Small Thing<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nosmallthing.net\/main\/view-from-the-back-seat\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta 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