It's a 2014 Tesla Model S. It cost nearly $100,000. It appeared before my eyes a few minutes after I requested a ride from Lyft...

While transporting me from Pioneer Square to the bottom of Beacon Hill (no bus between my exact points), the driver, a man in his 30s, explained that he bought the machine after years of saving money and living like a monk. It was the car of his dreams. He was sitting inside of a dream, and everything about it had the smoothness and futurism expected of electric transportation. He showed me how quickly and easily it accelerated. Just a touch of the pedal, and the machine made a quantum leap down the street.

Lyft was helping pay for this wonder. I was not impressed with the automobile (only buses and trains can do that), but the fact that it was part of the rideshare economy. It got me thinking about what else might appear the next time I used the Lyft or Sidecar app. A Bentley? A Ferrari? A Maybach? Is this some kind of sign of the times? Have we entered some sort of economic Bermuda Triangle in this Long Recession? Maybe entered a moment when the dials of American consumerism can only spin madly? When he accelerated, the machine made almost no noise.