The Carless Life

Yes, I said "carless" not "careless." I might be needing a hyphen there but I'm not sure. Anyway, I was thrilled to read a great article in the New Yorker on Keith Olbermann, "One Angry Man," this week. Not least because it was a really informative and kind of inspiring article on a man I knew little about, as I don't watch MSNBC much. Beyond his obvious passion for spot-on political commentary (not to mention sports, etc.) and great vocabulary and style ("acid caricature," "demonic mimicry" and a "lacerating indictment of Bush" included, according to the piece by Peter J. Boyer), he also DOESN'T DRIVE. Yay. I'm not alone.

I thought I'd found the only other kindred spirit in friend G., who, over drinks the other night, also confessed (wrong word: reported) that he doesn't drive. And now Keith (who doesn't because a head injury caused some vertigo or something that affects his balance at car speed). As for me, well, I CAN drive (stick but not automatic, comfortably) and kinda of really love to (as long as I'm in the only other car on the road). I took the bus living in LA and San Francisco, walk and, if forced, ride the subway in NYC, and depend on others in most other instances. My carbon footprint, by the way, is way smaller than my increasingly back-to-the-earth parents in (very) rural Maine. I'm not really patting myself on the back here, just trying to feel like less of a freak in this car-centric world.