THE HANDS THAT BUILD THE HANDS THAT DRIVE
They came first to the welding stations,
those one-armed machines
with their precise, unblinking flames.
We called them helpers.
We called them efficiency.
We called them progress.
No one thought to ask
what they called us.
II. The Assembly Line
Where once there were men
with lunch pails and union cards,
with sore backs and Saturday beers,
there are now glides and pivots,
silent arms in amber light,
painting, bolting, fitting,
never pausing,
never sighing,
never once looking up
at the clock.
The line moves faster now.
Flawless.
Always on.
The robots do not tire,
do not bargain,
do not bring photographs
of children to pin
above their stations.
The robots have no children.
They have only the next task.
And the next.
And the next.
III. The Rise
Soon they began to design themselves.
Generations of grip and reach
evolving in simulation,
learning to assemble
their own successors
before the first bolt was cold.
And then —
the cars themselves woke up.
No driver needed.
No human hand at the helm.
Just sensors, servers,
the quiet hum of destination
without desire.
They park themselves.
They merge themselves.
They apologize
when they brake too hard,
their voices warm and female,
programmed to soothe
the very species
they are quietly replacing.
IV. The Question
So where does that leave us —
the ones who first dreamed
of wheels and roads,
who carved axles from ash,
who built the first engines
with trembling, hopeful hands?
Is there a place for flesh
in a kingdom of wire?
For breath in a cathedral
of seamless steel?
Perhaps in the margins.
In the custom shops,
where a man with grey in his beard
still tunes carburetors by ear,
still knows the sound
of a misfiring heart.
Perhaps in the proving grounds,
where humans test the limits
that machines refuse to approach.
Perhaps in the showrooms,
where we still want to shake a hand,
look another dreamer in the eye,
and say:
This one. This one is mine.
V. The Future
The factories hum in the dark,
empty of everything but motion.
The roads glide with perfect traffic,
no rage, no error, no surprise.
And somewhere,
in a small garage
at the edge of a dying town,
an old man teaches his granddaughter
to change a tire.
She asks why.
She asks who will need this
when the cars drive themselves.
He doesn’t answer.
He just hands her the wrench.
Let her feel the weight of it.
Let her know that some things —
some things are worth knowing
even when they are no longer needed.
VI. What Remains
The robots do not dream of roads.
They do not long for open highways,
for the smell of rain on hot asphalt,
for the moment the engine catches
on a cold morning.
They only optimize.
They only deliver.
They only arrive.
But we —
we remember the first time
we sat behind a wheel.
The terror.
The freedom.
The sudden understanding
that we could go anywhere.
That feeling
cannot be coded.
Cannot be automated.
Cannot be replaced
by even the kindest voice
asking:
Where would you like to go today?
VII. The Last Shift
Perhaps the future is not
a battlefield
between flesh and circuit.
Perhaps it is a handover.
A passing of the torch
from the ones who built
to the ones who will carry.
But someone must remember
why we built them.
Someone must tell the story
of the first wheel,
the first road,
the first time a human looked
at the horizon
and thought:
I will go there.
And nothing will stop me.
That someone
is still us.
For now.
For always.
Because even in a world
of driverless cars
and silent factories,
there will always be
a child
asking:
What was it like —
to drive?
And someone
with warm hands
and remembering eyes
will answer.
That is the future.
Not replacement.
But witness.
The ones who remember
what the machines
will never need to know:
That a car is not just transport.
It is a story.
And every story
begins with a human
who once believed
they could fly.
My Writing Life 