Transportation smells

I've been thinking a lot lately about how much smells matter in America. We're crazy about staying clean (and invent killer viruses as an excuse to perpetuate our goals. . .), which is great for the aroma of crowded subways, but does this hygiene hysteria hurt our anti-car culture?

I walk or bike to school, not a very long distance, but long enough to pump up my heart rate. When I get to school, I find I'm a little sweaty, whether it's hot out or not (the jacket always shifts from a good idea to a bad halfway through the trip). If I walk into my office sweaty or smelling like I just worked out, it's far less professional than were I to walk in with a low heart rate, pale-faced and composed-- the same as, say, had I just stepped out of a car.

When people move, they smell. Their hair might frizz or look messy. Maybe their face even turns a little red--these are all symptoms of the dangerous task of physical exertion. In American culture today, it seems that bodily exertion has a place and time, one that does not coincide with transportation to and from your place of work. Sweating at the gym might be great, but mixing the ideal of staying in shape with the necessity of transportation and you're either unbalanced or in financial straits.

We are so used to driving cars places that we have disconnected the energy required to travel somewhere from energy of our bodies. Because cars utilize petroleum energy that stays out of sight in the heated, fragrant, and oil-free automobile interior, transportation costs money rather than costing energy.

Even in this era, I still want to pay for my personal transportation with my bodily energy. Maybe this means I will smell; maybe my stomach will growl halfway through class, begging for a refill after the long trip; maybe I'll even look healthily flushed or have sweat stains under my armpits. Yet, despite the unprofessional air I may be drawing to myself, I won't stop. Until we realize the costs of transportation, we as Americans can't get in touch with our energy systems or even our bodily capabilities.

Only when we remember that our fuel stops are at the grocery store can we proudly smell the whole way back.