I love classic rock. Led, The Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, Cream, The Who (who?), Dire Straits the list goes on and on. But to be a millennial and love that genre is a little…weird. People think I’m ‘above’ modern music (no, seriously) or that I’d rather live in the past than experience the present. They’re only sort of wrong. While I can’t listen to anyone named ‘Lil fill-in-the-blank’ for more than about 20 seconds, I can groove to some Audioslave (what?? that’s modern to me) or Macklemore. So when somebody places me on music duty, I freeze up. Where do I belong?
It’s the same when it comes to cars.
I love what cars do to people. I love why people love cars. They can be a challenge or a joy, but almost always it’s both. My first fun sports car was a ‘95 Miata that should have killed me at least 300 times over. It was too low, too loud, too obnoxious and too much stinkin’ fun. It had character… Unfortunately, it also had a leaky headgasket, crappy radiator, coilovers made from cement, and drank enough oil to catch the eye of the U.S. government. As I fixed, poked, prodded and worked on that car, I learned new expletives and new passions. I learned the frustrating and rewarding aspects of dirty, oily, grimy fingertips, and I loved it.
Having ‘cars’ as a passion seems to be considered old-school. There’s a whole multi-volume dissertation to be written about how the role of automobiles have changed in society. To me, they seem less and less like LEGOs and more and more like the newest iPhone; and to some degree, I’m right. Ask a 14-year-old what a carburetor is and they’ll confidently answer it’s what powered the Millennium Falcon. Ask the same kid to change an oil filter and he’ll scream ‘YEET!’ before scurrying away to play Clash of Clans. It’s just not what folks are curious about as much nowadays.
I love Star Wars, I love modern car gizmos, but I also love the tinker-ability of classics. I’m caught between modern and old school. Where do I belong?
Bainbridge Island doesn’t sound like the most interesting place in the world, car-speaking. The 10-mile-long island’s top speed limit is 50, which is probably the average age of the people living there. However, as I discovered at an appropriately rainy cars and coffee, Bainbridge’s car scene is a gold mine of interesting people, fascinating stories, and jaw-dropping automobiles. By far the youngest on the Bainbridge Cars and Coffee Facebook group, it sometimes feels like I’ve stepped into the Twilight Zone; I might be one of the few in the group that never got to see the show air live. However, as a youngster with wide eyes and an easily-satisfied appetite for beautiful cars, Bainbridge Island’s car story is worth telling. In the most interesting time of the automobile, I find myself right smack in the middle of the old(er) and the new. It’s fun, exciting, and a bit confusing.
It’s where I belong.