Rust is what happens to things that actually existed.
The road signs that stood out in the desert for decades, the filling station pumps that pumped their last gallon forty years ago, the motor courts where every generation found a place to stop before pushing on — they aged in public. The rust is honest. It's the record of time spent doing the real thing: wind and rain and the particular erosion that only comes from being somewhere people needed to go. Route 66 built things to last, and the things that lasted carry that proof on their surface.
