Once or twice every year, I rent a car for pleasure. This last January, it was a huge Chevy Tahoe, which I used to blast my way through the snow that paralyzed the MidAtlantic for a few days.
The itch has been going again recently, that desire to try something different, to do the Obvious Midlife Crisis thing and rent something radically different from our trusty and perfectly practical Hondas for a few days.
It being the weekend of Father's Day, I settled in on a Beemer, a BMW 840i Coupe with XDrive. It's a handsomely sleek broad-shouldered thing, the sort of vehicle one would expect to be driven by a gym-sculpted CryptoBro or the trust-fund offspring of an oligarch.
A small church pastor behind the wheel? It's a little anomalous, I'll admit.
It's sleek and shiny, with fat tires and a modified exhaust that snorts and burbles in unabashedly juvenile ways. More notably, the exhaust uncorks more power from BMW's excellent B58 three litre inline six, which sings in a rich pure tenor whenever you press the go pedal. The part of me that's still twelve finds it delightful.
It is also, apparently, a provocation.
In my history of car rentals, there's a certain type of car...Camaros, Mustangs, and Dodge Challengers...that stirs a response in other vehicles of that species. These are the cars with big potent engines, free-breathing vee-eights with burbling, snorting exhausts, the kinds of cars I drew in my notebook in math class when I was a sophomore in high school.
Muscle cars, in other words, the cars that flex and grunt and announce to the world on a Saturday night: "I am stronger than you." Get two of them together, it's like a pair of bull-elks in rut. The strong instinct is to bellow and to butt heads.
To them, a glistening and modded BMW eight series is like dark red blood in the water.
I can't remember a vehicle I've driven that has stirred more aggression responses. The Escalade that kept roaring past me. The Mustang GT that pulled in front and made several futile attempts to induce me to race. The lowered and cat-backed eight year old Lexus that snarled past, the driver shouting "GOGOGOGOGO!" The Dodge Charger that, passing me, just revved and revved and revved.
It is, I suppose, just a facet of driving a big Beemer. It's not just that it says, "I am stronger than you," but also that it implies to the muscle car owner: "I am wealthier than you." I'm not just displaying that I'm loud and fast. I'm loud and fast and rich, which would make me the most annoying person on the road.
Not that I'm driving the car that way. I'm using my turn signals (BMWs do have them). I'm letting people merge in front of me, and generally not living into the stereotype. I am, admittedly...er..."driving vigorously." I may have been listening to Rammstein a little more than usual. But never cutting people off, or tailgating.
Why do we enjoy power? Is it from the desire to dominate or control, to prove oneself superior to others?
Or is it for the pleasure of competence and a finely made machine, of the sound and feel of a well tuned engine and the sweetness of a Southern summer Sunday night?
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