Written for Vista Magazine.
Colorful lights pass by on either side. The interior of the car is quiet, and I watch my passenger’s eyeline shift left and right as we drift through the neon.
Los Ojos is a city of excess. The billboards glow, shifting from one ad to the next in real-time, based on data it has assembled from patrons as they pass. The cars guide themselves through an unstable dance, in which it seems uncertain if all those on the dance floor know they’re participating. Mannequins display faces of the passengers and pedestrians as they glide through the city. Technology hums from the billboards, glows in the pockets, paints lines through the streets, and gives emotions a color.
The FeelGrid, a piece of technology that examines the wearer’s emotional state, sits on my wrist as I push and pull my steering wheel. The pax, Neo Cab’s terminology for passengers, in my backseat can’t keep their eyes still — jutting, almost hurried dashes from left to right. The glow on my arm, a gentle green, shows that despite my pax’s erratic movement in the back, I am calm here in the front. Though these feelings may not last the ride.
Thoughts?