emissions test
Every year around this time - and this exact date two years in a row - I bring my car to get its New York State Emissions test. While it always comes back with a pass, it's something one must do. Their service is fast, 20 minutes or so, and there is a bodega on the corner selling bacon, egg, and cheese sandwiches on wedges - what many would call a hero or grinder roll. Picture a foot-long sandwich filled with crisped and salted strips of bacon, and unctuous fried eggs topped with cheese as American as the dream the owners of the establishment are living.
I am reading Scott Galloway's The Algebra of Happiness.1 It's decent but if you subscribe to his newsletter, it's all been written before. And sometimes said: as Brandon pointed out to me, Mr. Galloway reads his newsletter, word for word, every week. Never has a man monetized saying the same thing in slightly different ways since Miguel de Cervantes wrote Don Quixote, a novella stretched into 992 pages. Both write about chasing windmills: for Galloway, this is a mixture of both his pursuit in making his parents proud and for technology that will make him rich. But he professes to love his sons - and I’m inclined to believe him - so I’ll ease off the peddle a bit.
I finish my breakf(e)ast - it was a foot-long, after all - served on an actual plate at this bodega with tables and chairs. I step down the stairs and look across to the middle school where my daughter went for sixth grade. It was built in the 1930s and has served as the city's only school, then its high school, then its middle school, then its middle school just for sixth grade. Tens of thousands of students have passed through those doors.
This afternoon my daughter studies for a seventh grade science test on genotypes and phenotypes. I recall my eighth grade science class and a lesson given on diffusion. The teacher - and wrestling coach which will soon become apparent - Mr. D'Alessio used the following example to prove his point: if Skip Tilson2 breaks wind on the other side of the room, through the process of diffusion, Jon, despite being across the room, will detect through his nose the result a few seconds later. He will go on to teach us about semi-permeable membranes, the process of osmosis and later be suspended when the high school wrestling team over which he presided was caught hazing freshman with atomic pushups (don't look it up, trust me).
The New Oxford American Dictionary3 defines emission as “the production and discharge of something, especially gas or radiation”. The rejoinder after the comma is a modifier, not a necessity, but putting that aside for the moment, emissions have a negative connotation: greenhouse emissions, radioactive emissions from Chernobyl (the last great mini-series I watched), heavy metal emissions into our water (and into our ears), and car emissions. And with each of these emissions we try to reduce them, capture them, sequester them, eliminate them or, at a minimum, test them, as I do with my car today.
In New York State, a car’s emissions test is pretty straightforward. It's a quick procedure, done by any approved auto shop. It's inexpensive, under $40. It's required every year to maintain the ability to register one's car, though that happens once every two years instead of annually. Instead police, like those in my city checking for registration expirations, can ticket you for lapsed emissions tests though the fine doesn't kick in for 60 days and is less than the cost of the emissions test itself. Go figure.
But when one reads the fine print, it's not just the car's emissions that are tested. A safety inspection is also conducted. This inspection includes: seat belts; brakes; steering; chassis and other springs and bars for breakage; tires for wear (but specifically not the spare); lights, including overhead, headlights, license plate, and reverse/backup; windows, including tint; wipers and blades; horn; mirrors; and finally any fuel leaks.
California calls their emissions test a smog inspection which feels almost too on the nose. Twenty-one states don't require any emissions tests or safety inspections - it's easy to guess which ones; a subset of those don't even require a safety inspection. New Hampshire requires both: so much for Live Free or Die.
More than seven hundred words in, I've already lost half of you, though those I’ve lost and those I’ve kept, now know far more than you ever wanted to know about emissions tests. For the rest of you still reading, stick with me: this will all make sense.
A car or light truck emissions and safety inspection serve as both an individual and common good. Individually, they ensure the driver and his passengers are safe, that the seatbelts work, that the tires aren't too worn, that the brakes aren't broken, that the driver can see what’s in front of them during the day - no cracked windshields (windscreens to you of British heritage, which never made sense to me as a screen has holes) - and is able to look at the road ahead and alert other drivers behind of your braking car avoiding rear-end accidents.
Serving the common good, these tests reduce the amount of greenhouse gasses that are emitted into the atmosphere, they ensure that unsafe vehicles are off the road less likely to cause accidents reducing innocent bystanders and unnecessary strains on public safety workers, while simultaneously providing your local mechanic with potential long-term customers. And it bears repeating, these tests are minimal from a cost, and quick from a time and scheduling, perspective. I called the day before my appointment and was told I would be seen right as it opened. And I was.
As we approach the one thousand words mark, I expect that I'm down to a quarter of you still curious how I will land this plane. Or rather, park this car in the garage. I'm curious myself. Let's continue.
And as I do, I started to think about my own emissions. No, not those. I refer here to the things I emit from my mouth to the air around me or from my head to the screen at my fingertips: words. These words take many forms. They can be good words: great job; thank you; I love you. They can be helpful words: let me get the door for you; let me make dinner tonight; do you want me to drive you to school today? They can be funny words: a joke, typically of the dad genre; a pun; a wry observation. They can be hurtful words: I hate this; can you believe what he/she did; you moron; you idiot; you asshole; you shithead; you piece of human garbage.
Sometimes I put these words together in a text message. Sometimes these text messages are sent at early hours, never late as I'm usually already asleep. Sometimes these text messages are sent one after the other in rapid fire fashion. No break, stream of consciousness, typically of the vitriolic variety.
Sometimes I spout off from my mouth, shooting from the hip, mailing massive missives via text, brain dumping whatever is on my mind without filter, without a muffler to dampen the effluvia I send out into the world. This may be done in an effort to spout off steam, to release some of the pressure built up by anger in the exhaust pipes, or simply to complain like the rattle from my car's heat shield when I hit 1250 RPM or express discomfort associated with the vertigo I get when I lay down and turn my head to the right just like my axle makes when I allow my steering wheel to return to neutral after a hard right into our driveway.4 It is these words I speak of when I talk about emissions and the associated testing and inspection that need to occur. There are moments I find myself in what feels like an unstoppable series of sentences that seem to go on in a meandering pathway of obscenity and absurdity. It is in these moments that I realize an emissions test would come in handy.
What would such an emissions test look like? It should be noted that a standard car emissions test doesn't look for zero emissions to be released. It is not a full censorship of emissions or a complete elimination of emissions. The test is to determine the level of which the vehicle - and the associated age of that vehicle as older vintage vehicles get a certain pass - is allowed to emit.
As is the case with children, as with new cars: our emissions are expected to be less damaging. As we and our cars age, there is an expectation of increased emissions, though there are still limits. Sometimes this is based on the location: certain counties in certain states do not require testing at all; certain locations, like major cities or offices or public spaces, require our personal emissions to be less noxious.
As we move from the physical to the virtual space, our emissions are no less throttled. But certain people have certain exemptions. Elon Musk and politicians can spew whatever vitriol they want with minimal real pushback; my father, with no more smog-like words, has been banned from Facebook more times and with increasing duration for telling others where he think the Grand Old Party belongs. His car is no longer street legal for telling Zuckerberg where he can shove it, in a fusillade of expletives and, I am wont to say, accurate name calling.
In addition to the emissions we emit from the mouth in the form of words, we also emit carbon dioxide. In copious amounts, it too is noxious. Enough to kill a man. Severe hypercapnia, as it is known, occurs when one has more than 75 mmHg of it in your blood. But when emitted during exercise, we don't come close to hitting that mark - unless you exercise in a vacuum or with one of those stupid Bain-like Oxygen training masks. And instead of hastening death, we prolong life. And we make more of that life in the process.
Maya Angelou said that “life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.” I think she's right, but not in the way she implied. That is, if she actually said it, which she didn’t. Putting that aside, breathing through exercise and exertion is like the love that John Lennon5 spoke of: and in the end, the breath you take is equal to the breath you make. The breathtaking is equal to the breathmaking and how that breathmaking is done.
As I return to get my car from the mechanic, I read the sign that says they also recycle oil. I think about my parents, who reside in North Carolina, where recycling is optional, and an extra expense, something two liberals - my dad a likely-currently-banned-from-Facebook-for-saying-something-against-the-GOP Liberal and my mom along for the ride holding onto the "oh shit" bar from the passenger seat - decide to forego. Battles need to be picked.
I think about how one's annual - who really goes every year? - physical is another manifestation of a personal emissions test. They test one's urine and blood for abnormalities, for concentrations above or below certain benchmarks. Unlike an emissions and safety check, that spare tire of yours is assessed. Some doctors will test your vision, but usually you go to a special doctor for that, though pediatricians will typically test for distance. Your weight, and height are measured, from which one can measure your Body Mass Index, an inaccurate and silly measure if ever there was one, especially for those without bird bones and with some level of muscle mass. Your blood pressure, pulse and blood oxygen are checked, again, more as a safety measure to ensure you can safely return to the road. Sadly, your mechanic likely spends more than twice as long on your car as your primary care physician6 spends with you. Sometimes you're referred to a specialist for further tests or treatment. Just like your car.
I'm approaching the age where some additional tests are called for where they really look under the hood. Perhaps that's why I haven't had a physical in a few years as I know it's looming around the bend (over) for me. Perhaps it's also because I know I'll have more paperwork to do ahead of the visit, paperwork that hasn't changed in years. Perhaps I've also put off my physical because I'm worried what they may find. I was worried about taking my car in for its emissions test because of the potential muffler noise and was worried I'd fail the inspection which is silly because the longer I waited the less time I'd have to remedy it before the time period was up to avoid a fine and the failed test would cause a retest having to pay again for the same service.
Glaucoma runs in our family. While I'm not sure this is a genetic or hereditary trait, it's something that I know I need to get checked as I age, too. And just as my car's windshield must be checked for cracks and my headlights checked for use, my eyes require examination like the one I'm heading to this week.7 Having driven for almost 30 (!) years, in the last year, my car windshield has cracked twice, the first requiring replacement, which they cracked on insertion; the second crack was caused by my own strength (or stupidity) as I attempted to scrape the ice from it this winter, though this second time is more cosmetic than detrimental to my safety: it passed inspection. There's an important reminder in all this: while age can cloud one's vision in a literal sense - we all will need glasses eventually - it's the figurative sense - the stubbornness, the failure to see an improvable future, the longing for the past because it's familiar, easier to see - that is the test we all must conduct.
As we close, in the time it took you to read this, your car's emissions test would be just over halfway complete. Testing your own emissions is a lifelong process. I'm just over halfway through if I live to be 85. Pass or fail, there's enough road ahead to get it right, through the ups and downs. Whatever the result.
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Name not changed to protect the innocent, for he is guilty: he dealt it, as you will soon see.
Apologies to those across the pond.
At the time of publication, this rattle, and the creaking axle have been fixed.
Yes, Brandon, I'm referencing a Beatle.
General practitioner. On a related note, I've always preferred female physicians; my wife has always preferred male physicians. This, and our mutual dislike of The Beatles have kept our marriage strong for fourteen years.
Wish me luck.