Today is a brand new Subaru. No plates yet even. Of course the interior smells like car dealership and looks like a museum of beige. The driver wears a red sweatshirt that matches his car, which makes me think his interior is beige. Unlike most casual carpools, he’s following the radio rule: talk radio. The only hint of character is a tiny plastic bulldog affixed to the center of the dashboard, in the shallow depression before the white 7-segment LED display of temperature, gasoline remaining, and time. I think the bulldog’s face is meant to look aggressive, but some sculpting, manufacture, or management incompetence means it actually looks existentially distraught, like it’s staring through a hole in the fabric of the universe that has just opened up, seeing something, which, before this moment, was not possible. The bulldog is beige.