garrison beau scott

Growing up in Southern California, complete with grandparents that redefined the concept of doting, well, we went to Disneyland. A lot. My grandfather and I had a favorite ride, Autotopia, where you would get into a car and drive along a course that wove through Tomorrowland. He’d always let me drive, even when I couldn’t see over the steering wheel, and would laugh with delight whenever I crashed into the car ahead of us, or were crashed into from behind.

It really wasn’t driving, as the cars were on a track and the only real control you had over the car was stopping and starting. If one was so inclined, they could take their hands completely off the steering wheel and just step on the accelerator and make it through just fine.

And I’m wondering now, thirty and change years later, and my shotgun grandpa no longer with us, what if we just take our hands off the steering wheel? Would it be just as fun to bump along on the track, crashing into and being crashed into the cars that are on the track with us? Or is that why we pay admission to theme parks, because life isn’t like that? Though sometimes it feels like it.

When it does, I try to remember my grandfather’s sage advice when it came to those cars in our way, “Ram ‘em!”