Considering I would no longer be subjecting myself to any of that,
the theft was actually a sort of liberation.
This was, after all, the
car radio. Is there any device of modern
life more routinely despised? I don't know about you, but I drive
around, punching buttons, scanning and searching, all but sending
out reconnaissance parties, trying to find signs of intelligent
life on the dial. Coming up empty and infuriated, I usually end up
sliding in a CD.
But I've heard all of my CDs a thousand times. Even the new ones.
Especially the new ones.
So, in a way, I should actually thank the thief. In my car-cocooned
solitude, not having the distraction of all that noise would give
me the opportunity to listen to my own thoughts. The problem is, I
discovered after only a few short trips around town, that I don't
have any thoughts.
I wanted my radio back. Like an aggravating friend who drives you
up a wall, it was still nice to have around. Even though I knew it
was gone, I found myself reaching for its dial. It was like
absent-mindedly setting a place at the table for a child who'd
recently gone to college.
I missed my radio. I missed complaining about it. Now I'd have to
find something else in my daily life to use as a metaphor for
everything that is wrong with the world, which is not as easy as
you might think.
But I also missed the thing itself. I missed the surprise of coming
across a favorite song. I missed intelligent conversation to
stimulate and challenge and inform me, which, believe it or not,
does exist.
What I especially missed was the slack-jawed astonishment that
comes when landing on something truly miraculous - I'll never
forget hearing "Waiting for the Man" by
Lou Reed while traveling on
an autumn leaf-peeping tour through the Green Mountains of Vermont.
I'd never heard that song before and I've never heard it since on
the radio. I heard the entire two sides, completely uninterrupted,
of the Beatles'
Rubber Soul album on a station in the middle
of
Michigan. In
Louisiana, I heard one remarkable zydeco song after
another.