The car was a 1957 Chevy Bel Air, which is a beautiful machine if you are admiring it from the outside and a terrible one to meet face-first at speed. In 1993 I learned that the hard way. The dashboard of that car was made from the kind of metal Detroit used when it believed automobiles should be built like locomotives. It looked elegant from the passenger seat. It felt considerably less elegant when my teeth collided with it. Several shattered immediately. Others cracked dee