Wired Muscle

I had a dream about a car last night and it looked a lot like the one pictured on the left. If you know your cars, you know that’s a 1971 Gran Torino GT. Long story short, it’s got a big engine and one version of this rocket does 0-60 mph in 6 seconds. I’m not sure why I dreamed about a car but the minute I woke up I wondered what the significance was, if any.

In the dream I was looking for a muffler for this beast and a guy at the auto parts store showed me one he thought would fit the car. In the dream, the clerk follows me outside to see the car and can’t believe anyone still owns a mint condition Gran Torino GT from the muscle era. As he was talking I thought, “If this car is so rare, how come I never drive it? I don’t drive it to work or anywhere. I treat it like a Sunday ride.  That’s not cool.”

I woke up thinking, I’d like to ride in one of those but after I got over the disappointment of not actually owning one, I thought, “I’m wired kind of like that car – simple and ready to move fast.” Then it struck me that wiring is useful for operation. How can you be wired for agility, speed and competition (for example) and be relegated to a show car? Wiring is for everyday functionality. The Gran Torino GT was  “inspired by supersonic aircraft with narrow waists and bulging forward and rear fuselages needed to reach supersonic speeds.” So I suppose the dream insight is that design is not meant to impress, such effect is simply a byproduct that materializes when we perform to our specification.