I’m pumping gas yesterday and that song from the seventies that says something about ‘never going back to my old school’ crackles from the sound system. Though I wouldn’t know a Steely Dan song if it walked up and kicked me, I’m pretty sure it’s a Steely Dan song. Steely or not, it’s one of those songs that I wouldn’t regularly listen to, but hazily bookmarks certain memories. So I’m listening and staring blankly into the resplendent* blue of the gas pump and I ease back in time right into the passenger seat of my brother’s (also resplendently blue) Chevy Nova.

It’s not clear exactly what year it is, but it’s probably somewhere around the time when the song was new. He’s driving fast down that ridiculously narrow road. (I would discover in later years that riding your bike down that road was like charging straight ahead into the jaws of death.) He hocks one out the window and tries not to swear in front of me, “Shhh—ugar…” We come to a stop sign and I’m feeling supercool to be riding with my big bro in his bas-ass car**. Then, all at once I’m ripped back to the present as the pump stops, the song shifts to “Sweet Child of Mine” and the very large woman at the next pump sings (?) along with high enthusiasm and even higher volume.

Blinking deeply, I screw the gas cap back on and tear out of there thinking that there is no possible thing in all of humanity that would ever get me to go back to my old school. I consider hocking one out the window, but my mouth is all dry from drinking coffee all day.

* Vocabulary courtesy of thesaurus.com. I’ve discovered that I use the word ‘brilliant’ way too often so I’m trying branch out a little. I know… the internet right?

** Some might contest how ‘bad-ass’ the Nova actually was, but I thought it was awesome when I was like eight or so.