Please be gentle cycle

I've heard of the "magic" of laundromats like there is supposed to be something romantic about them or something.  I don't see it.  I went to one, my first, the other day.  I'll admit that it was a good way to practice pretending to be a local while learning how to be one.  I was too busy trying to figure out what, when and where to put the detergent into which machine to bother with magic.  The only thing I noticed was a lack of WiFi despite the "Free WiFi" signs.  To fill the time, I spied a flatscreen TV in the corner, you know the ones that look good but you totally just got the cheap one from Walmart?  It was a documentary about an old famous NASCAR race in Daytona Beach, Florida.  I started watching it and I'm not sure if it was the heat and drone of the dryers or the intoxicating Downy Soft aromatherapy but I found myself in an unblinking trance, totally engulfed in this 1990 race.  The announcer's voice rambled on about obscure details while he efficiently called the race.  You could tell he was someone who not only knew what he was talking about, but loved it as well, like maybe he grew up in Daytona and watched the races from the fence and memorized the car numbers and driver's names when he was a kid. The unwavering commentary helped pull me into the story.  


It brought me back to just a year prior when a short drive from campus would have brought me to that very same hallowed racetrack.  It was a short step from there to memories of my childhood when I used to be able to go into the garage and see the huge metal monster that lived there.  


It was a racecar in the most literal definition of the term, but what I saw was a frame, body, fuel tank, seat and controls, all solely dedicated to pulling as much power out of that 358 small block as possible.  It had no muffler, no windows and it lived to go fast.  Every Friday in the summer my dad would load it up on the trailer like the road wasn't worthy to experience that kind of power (it had four different sized tires, after all).  The car would come back covered in red Mohawk River clay.  It was white, with a number 9, and it was a monster.  Seeing how basic the car was helped me understand systems even at that young age, and it helped me realized that I could learn how to take apart and fix my own things.  I didn't have to be an ignorant operator of the stuff that I bought, slave to the experts when it broke down.  Hells bells, I could even build my own things if I had the means.  Throughout my younger years the things around me; vacuum cleaners, refrigerators, even the house itself became things that I knew and understood deeper than their visible surface.  It was moments like these that lead me to want to be a creator, an engineer, an inventor.  It used to be a joke when I would "talk" to my car but now there is absolutely a higher connection between me and the things that I love.  It's a connection that I am forever grateful to have been given by Mom and Dad.  

Laundromats are full of crap.  The only magic I see is dissapearing quarters.