Drive-through country refers to places that one drives through but never stops in. These areas share the following common characteristics. The first is an abundance of businesses catering to car needs, such as
auto repair shops, car dealerships, and gasoline stations. The second is the lack of accomodations provided for
pedestrians. The sidewalks, if at all present, are very narrow strips that have cracks and holes in them, along with various littered junk including soda cans, shards of glass, cigarette butts and discarded flyers from nearby malls.
Even if walking in these areas is possible, it is highly undesirable. The multi-lane roads in drive-through country are often filled with
trucks that produce loud noises grating to the ear. Picture someone's hoarse, hissing voice amplified to concert-strength volume. Furthermore, these trucks are also health hazards - the volumes of smoke billowing out of their long metal
exhaust pipes is disseminated in the wind and goes up your nostrils. Not only is the smell unpleasant, but you also get a little bit of headache and a woozy, nauseous feeling to go along with it.
Your ears aren't the only thing that hurts from being in drive-through country, your eyes hurt as well. The various
automobile-related businesses you encounter on your walk are visually hideous. Observing the drab, industrial gray cement covering of the buildings and the
roads that surround them, you wish this
industrial wasteland was livened up by some green - something like the trees, lawns, hedges, and flowers that are plentiful in expensive residential suburbs. The grayness reminds you that what once might have been a neighborhood has been turned into a
concrete wasteland unwelcome to its former human inhabitants.
And at no time are you reminded of drive-through country's unwelcomeness to you as a human being than when you try to cross the street. As you wait for one of the multiple lanes of traffic, whizzing by before you at every crossing, to grudgingly notice your presence and stop to let you pass, you realize that impatience of one of those drivers while you cross might just cost you your life.
Someone reading this might ask, "But why would any sane person ever walk through drive-through country, if it's
clearly only made for driving?" While its certainly true that most people pass the roads of drive-through country on their way to wherever they are going, some people live there.