“An academic definition of Lynchian might be that the term “refers to a particular kind of irony where the very macabre and the very mundane combine in such a way as to reveal the former’s perpetual containment within the latter.”And so it was last evening as I made my nightly drive home from work that my car notified me that I was low on fuel and that I would need to make a stop at a gas station. I pull into a random place that I rarely go to and I can't even remember the name of the place. On that note, I did pass a gas station on the way to Parkville called Please Stop. Probably the most politely named placed I've ever seen, but it also makes me think that the place is in trouble and they're begging passing drivers to stop.
And so I get out of my car and go through my normal routine where I touch something metal on my car to discharge the static electricity that I have built up over the day, undo the gas cap, insert and quickly remove my credit card, select the gas, wait no go back, select against receiving a receipt and car wash, lift up the pump, then select gas, put pump in car and finally look around parking lot as car is being filled.
To my left a teenager is getting out of his SUV parked near the street, while a female passenger sits. Closer, another teenager with a lanyard hanging across his neck and over his back is cleaning his windshield. To my right an older man with white hair and dressed in a suit minus the jacket is cleaning his rear windshield. No big deal. Normal, everyday stuff.
A second later I look around and the SUV teenager is pacing back in the street looking for something. Something must have fell out in the road while he was driving. The lanyard teenager is still cleaning is windshield. Hasn't this gone on for a little too long, I think. When was the last time I cleaned my windshield? I can't remember. It's not something I particularly think to do unless it's very much necessary. To my right the old gentleman is using that cleaning brush on his bumper. Huh? That's kinda strange I think. I don't realize it at the time, how strange this all is, but I keep watching the man in the tie and white shirt with sleeves rolled up. He's washing his bumper and license plate. He's going over the rear brake lights. I hadn't seen that before, I say to myself. I look over and the teenager is running across the street looking on the other side of the fairly busy highway. The other teenager is done washing his windshield as I hear his wipers drop and hit the glass. That's normal, I think, I've seen that before. I look back to the old man he's going over the roof of his car now. What could he possibly be doing that for? Dust? Back to the teenager with the clean windshield. He's not done, but I thought I heard the windshield wipers hit. He's methodically going over the corners of the glass and getting the last streams of water. He's being very careful as he glides the squeegee over the glass. Back to the old man. Still going over his entire car. Back to the young man. Now going over the roof of his car. Back to the kid who is now walking back to the SUV, still not sure what he was looking for and it doesn't look like he found it. I stop when the gas reaches $10 dollars. I feel like I'm in a weird twilight episode. Something is just not quite right. I leave the gas station in a haste. I don't look back but I imagine you middle aged business man has moved on to his hood and front license plate and the teenager with the lanyard has moved down to where water has dripped on to the tires and is going over the curves with the squeegee. Maybe it's not weird. Maybe it's perfectly normal. And I suppose it is perfectly normal for people to combine the very macabre with the very mundane act of filling up your car with gas and cleaning the windows.
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