My '55 Buick
Do you remember your favorite car? What about your first one? What car did you take on your first date? Got backseat memories?
As a baby boomer, I have thoughts about the future and what it holds for me and my family in this chaotic world. When I think of the way things could turn out in ten or twenty years, I resort to nostalgia. You know, the good ol’ days.
My most vivid memories are from the 1960’s and 70’s. Some of you remember the better good ol’ days of the 1950’s. I came to power in the late 60’s when my conscience woke up to my surroundings. As the 70’s emerged I discovered the world and its devices.
Some things about the 70’s I want to put out of my memory. For instance, designer color choices for everything from carpeting to furniture, clothing and cars all done in green, gold and brown. YUK! Mid 1970’s was all about disco. Then around ’78 we all went urban cowboy. What a flip.
I got married in ’76 to Rachel and we are still here together. Most of our friends from back then are not. Another one of my most vivid memories is when I started working for myself. Little did I know that would be my future of happiness and misery.
In today’s multi-faceted media, people are talking about nostalgia and how to market to us boomers. The argument is about us wanting to relive the past and how we want to live it. I love nostalgia but I’ve been focusing on what the future holds. My opinion is this; we want both. But what do we expect?
The future holds surprises both good and bad. We know that as long as there are forces who wish us to be in subjection we will indefinitely be in debt, worry about the earth, healthcare and fear for our children and grand children’s future. Some we can’t control but we can relive our past to an extent.
We can control some of our future; work at staying healthy, wise financial decisions and where we want to retire. So it ain’t all bad.
Now for the icing on the cake. The past is where you and I want to be. For the most part, what do our minds revert to? Cars. No matter what we survived from the past we all love to think about that old car we had and many of us want to own that particular vehicle or look at pictures of it.
My first car, which I still have, was a 1954 Ford. Before I turned 16 I had already owned four cars with many more since then. Although that old Ford is in pretty bad shape, I love to remember how I earned the money to buy it and how I got it home, all the fun I had working on it although frustrating. There’s a story in there.
I’m sure many of you have fond memories about your first car or any one of them from your past. I do and even though I wish I had most of them back I know deep down inside that won’t happen.
Marketers have been trying to understand us boomers and what we want out of our lives so they can sell us something. Just ask and we will tell.
Our ride is important. We buy more new vehicles than Gen Y or X and even Z. We spend more money on specialty aftermarket parts to enhance the appearance of our vehicles. We come from an era when your car meant something, of automotive coolness and even though we may be driving a Toyota or Cadillac now, we still have the need to know that car is all ours.
One area of growing interest is the classic and collector car market. We boomers come from the 50’s and 60’s and70’s. Most of us drove some kind of cool ride in school. I had several ranging from my ‘54 Ford to a bad ass 1955 Chevy 2 door hardtop tire scorcher. Yep, I was king of the back road drag strip back then.
When I think about all the fun I had with my cars from the past I get a sudden thrust of happiness in my heart. For some of you the thought of drag racing on a public road is a bad thing but back then we did not have all the media attention about the danger. Yes it was dangerous but in my hundred or so races no one ever got hurt or killed. We were fearless and confident.
Baby boomers, man or woman, love to think of the day they saw their first Mustang back in 64. You might remember when the new style Chevy Chevelle 454 SS came out in 1970 and how fast it was. The SS came out before then, but this one was deadly. That car was king of the street. Remember the “Little Deuce” coupe song? Lot’s of guys I know had one just like it.
Many of the car guys I do business with love talking about school days and the cool customs or hot rods they owned. These memories make them feel good. They yearn for the days of miss-spent youth, backseat memories and greasy hands. Turning wrenches in the middle of the night even if the next day you had a big test in school. That didn’t worry you. You were more interested in how your car sounded.
We loved our cars back then. They had style and meaning. We love them now but the difference in between the two is this; back then cars were part of our makeup, they were driven with earth shattering skill and fearlessness and what we did to our cars taught us about life.
Now days you buy a new car and add a few stick-on trinkets to make it feel like home. Back in the good old days we rustled around junk yards for pieces that would enhance to power and looks of our creation.
Baby boomers today are in tune with what’s going on in the world. We are tech savvy, own businesses, some are financially secure and for the most part we are doing pretty well. But we still want something from our youth. It all seems unattainable.
Our passion for classic cars, collectible muscle cars, cool customs and hot rods are a strong indicator that we know what we want. Although most of us older guys don’t wear the greasy jeans and sporting ducktails, there is a movement that has been going for years with the younger set. They have stepped back with cool traditional looking rides.
Many of our younger car guys and gals are doing the ‘50’s thing. Big time. From traditional style hot rods and lead sled kustoms complete with tattered greasy jeans and whitewalls. These kids are reliving what looks to be an authentic recreation of our past. Some of it works. Mostly it just looks that way.
Whether or not they are doing the real thing from the past or not, I think it is good for the old car industry in general. We are witnessing a resurgence of what the past meant to us older car guys and that is to keep life simple but remember this is a crazy world we live in now.
In today’s frustrated world, politicians see dollar signs in everything we love. That is the burning bridge to what we hold dear. If we as baby boomers want to live the past, we better get on with it before some idiot in Washington decides how bad it is for us and reduces it down to recycled garbage. – Mikey www.carisms.com
