Thirty minutes ago I was hustling a car through the rolling, glass-smooth two-lanes of Virginia's horse country, my hands happily clasped to a thick, three-spoke steering wheel as I arced the front tires through kinks and bends and wriggles, my feet playing the three pedals as if I were summoning bass notes on a pipe organ, my right hand jumping to the five-speed manual lever to choose shifts up and down, suspension beneath me deftly deflecting road bumps while keeping all four corners locked down and obedient. I was having fun.

I was not driving a Porsche, though. My grins appeared from the helm of a station wagon.

Once a staple of American idiom, the term "station wagon" has in recent decades all but slipped into disuse, now found way back in the synonyms drawer alongside words like "dull," "archaic," and "I'd rather have a big ol' SUV." But as I wrote in a recent Motor Trend column, a lot of us still like station wagons -- and there's about wagons to like. After all, wagons are more nimble than taller crossovers and SUVs, more fun to drive, and often more fuel-efficient.

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