[Ed’s Note: The following rant is courtesy of an old friend, Frankiess. He’s a blogger, video artist, used car salesman, student of life; there are a number of things in the modern world that really grind his gears. He drives a 2004 RX-8 -Antti]
I took the RX-8 for a bit of an afternoon wash. And being the woodhead that I am, I forgot my chammy at home. And drying up the car after a wash in these temperatures is essential, so I made a pitstop at a nearby parking garage. It’s gonna be frozen stiff in the morning, I just know it..
..anyway. I wasn’t the only one looking to benefit from a well-ventilated underground warm garage.
A Buick whatever landbarge [Ed’s note: Someone will probably know the exact year] rolled up, and the most comically stereotypical elder-greaser got out for a smoke. The sight was impressive amongst all the middle class moms rolling into their Toyotas with shopping bags full of mundanity. I just had to say hi. And being a proud owner, he was glad to give me a quick tour.
The Buick wasn’t too old, he said, only some 40 years of age. I neglected to mention that it had less rust than my 2004 Mazda. He said it feels like new, with only 60k miles on the odo. I had my doubts, but the interior actually did look like it had rolled out of the shop yesterday. And I’m not talking about some plastic factory in the Philippines. This had a definite sense of “premium” all over it.
He showed me the original receipt for the car. A price of 5300 dollars, which included the fm-radio unit, a rare option at the time! What really surprised me though, was the clearly driver oriented cabin, with all the controls arranged around the driver’s seat. It immediately gave the car, that only 5 minutes ago was just a ton of metal to me, some character. Yeah, i could imagine someone having a leisurely cruise in this thing.
“I coulda registered it as a museum car, but hell, then i could only drive it for 30 days in a year. And I wanna drive this baby daily!” the man explained. “You drive this every day? Impressive!” I asked, while trying to figure out the friction coefficient of a Buick riding on summer tyres in icy weather. “Of course! It’s insane to own a car you like and not USE it!” he exclaimed, and sidenotingly added “Which means weekly washes and rust protection treatments in the summer.” I also neglected to point out that this land barge gets the same MPG as my Mazda.
I listened to his rant about modern society with its consumer culture and disposable products: appliances, tools, furniture and cars most of all being impossible to maintain and even cheaper to just swap for a new one. Followed by the resulting generation of practically inept people, with skills enough to create facebook pages or maybe a youtube video, but no clue as to how a carburettor works.
I’m always up for a discussion about the degradation of modern society, but I never thought I’d find myself in one while listening to an aged gearhead in the parking garage of the local supermarket. The whole American car-scene in Finland, which up ’til now I’d considered a strange cult-like phenomenon consisting of greaseheaded, leathercoated yokels in oversized industrial aged landyachts, started to make sense to me.
I mean, maybe we all really should find our inner roots, give up this life of spending and return to the wild. … in a 1970s Buick Electra.
[Photos & Text: Janne Pitkänen]
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