Car thoughts

The car was meant to make it easier to see and meet each other.

It has not.
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Most of us spend our time alone in the car driving to or from work.
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Alone sitting in traffic.
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Or to some other place where there are plenty of strangers.
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Because the car means we do not know most of the people we see.
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Without the car there would be no zillion miles of suburbs.
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Because we would need to be within walking distance to various shops, post offices, schools, and a train or metro station.  
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The car, has also exacerbated separation and brought life indoors. 
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It is ironic indeed that the car, which in theory should bring people closer together by reducing travel time, has had the opposite effect. 
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Consider that without the car, life as we know it today would not exist. 
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It is no accident that older towns and cities, built before the age of the car, are much denser than the sprawling suburbs-without-a-city that comprise newer metropolitan areas.
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No accident either that cars tend to take us away from our homes whenever we have free time.
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Our homes are used less as we spend more time in our cars going and coming.
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Cars also create status between neighbours.
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Creating status between strangers.
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Creating tension as we drive forever wondering if there are problems ahead.
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Cars dictate the shape of our lives controlling how long we will take from here to there.

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Cars are rapidly if not already becoming commodities.
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Where do we go from here?
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Why own a car?
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More and more schemes offer car hire by the hour day or week.
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No insurance costs.
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No maintenance worries.
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However for many a car is still an important statement.
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And yet as our worry about having the right labels begins to dissipate with the ongoing recession.
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So might our view of cars change. 
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Cars are truly commodities once they have left the sales forecourt.
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Once we have sat in our first traffic snarl up.
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Just a seat in a line of other seats staring up the road.
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Wishing we could be anywhere but..........
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So long to cars as we once knew them.
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Just another commodity really.