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The Write Side of 59

~ This is What Happens When You Begin to Age Out of Middle Age

The Write Side of 59

Tag Archives: driving

I Love My Car Because It’s MY Car

23 Friday Aug 2013

Posted by Lois DeSocio in Confessional

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

confessional, driving, Lois DeSocio, SUV, The Write Side of 50

car me

My cockpit.

BY LOIS DESOCIO

I must riff on Julie’s post from yesterday about her car, because I counter her disdain of driving with a kicky passion for it that rivals the romance a pilot must have with taking to the skies in his or her plane. For me, a wheel in hand, and a road ahead, unfailingly filters life’s daily pummels.

I adore my car. I do not have the hip convertible that Julie has (I have my hip, though), but I do have a posh, black … SUV. I’ve had it for three years now. It was my first new car in ten years, and as soon as I brought it home, it would instigate head-scratching among some friends: “Why did you buy another “mom car?” (It’s not a “mom car,” thank you, because it’s not a minivan.) And it does not holster sippy cups, and the seats are never sticky.

It’s neither garish, nor gigantic, but it’s roomy enough to lug my stuff, and generous enough in height to allow a view from above on the highways. And after years of driving the family car, in which I taught my sons to drive, and subsequently shared with them so often that it became more their locker room, and less my wheels, for the first time in decades, I have a car that is mine. Just mine.

It has become a salve to some of the wallops life has thrown my way lately. My car has become the one thing to which I am a coxswain. It is my trusty vessel. It takes me wherever I want to go. It stays where I put it. I can lock out anyone I choose. It’s cool in the summer;warm in the winter. The top doesn’t come off, but it has a hole in the roof that lets in the wind without messing my hair. I can make phone calls in it, ask it directions; listen to music and scream-sing along with abandon. It doesn’t lie, manipulate, talk back or ask for money. (It’s paid off.) And it’s fast. I can merge, slow down, cut off, and speed up as I choose. Or I can just sit in it in my garage and talk to myself. I don’t need it to commute to work, so the milage is low, and gas-guzzling is kept at bay. I plan to keep it forever.

So, in mid-life, when the road ahead can be bumpy, and there’s a need to put the brakes on it all for a bit, it’s my car that often steers me away for a while.

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Staying Cool from 5 to 50 and Beyond

08 Monday Jul 2013

Posted by WS50 in Concepts, Opinion

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Tags

Air conditioners, Automobiles, driving, heat, ice cold drinks, The Write Side of 50, then and now

AC...and the most refreshing drive you'll ever experience.

AC…and the most refreshing drive you’ll ever experience.

By Frank Terranella

Being over 50 means remembering when there was no Internet, no cell phones, no ATMs and no cable television. It means remembering a time when seat belts were optional equipment in cars, and most cars did not have air conditioning.

I was reminded of this last item recently while driving on a 90-degree day. Since almost all cars today have air conditioning, I saw no one whose windows were down. And yet I can remember driving with the windows down. As kids we would even stick our hands and (if our parents weren’t paying attention) our heads out the window like the family dog.

It was a great sensation to have the hot air rushing by – sort of like a do-it-yourself fan.
And of course, back in the ‘50s and ‘60s fans were everywhere in the summer. We had them in our bedrooms at home and in our classrooms at school. They didn’t do much good, but it was better than nothing.

A few years ago I was asked by a young boy, “What did you do before air conditioning.” I answered truthfully, “We were hot!” It’s similar to the question, “What did you watch when there were only seven TV channels?” Answer: “We watched the seven channels and were thankful for them.”

The point is that before we got air conditioning in our cars and in our homes, we simply made do with fans and cold drinks. That was what made summer different from winter. We experienced the full force of the season back then, and we survived it. I swear that a major part of the attraction of going to the movies back then was the air conditioning.

Don’t get me wrong, I have absolutely no desire to go back to those days any more than I have a desire to return to a time without the Internet. I was thrilled when my father had an electrician install an air conditioner in our house. I felt more civilized when I bought my first car in 1976 and it had air conditioning.

In fact, if you’re over 50 you may remember an Easter when the temperature was in the 90s. That was 1976 and I had just brought home my new Pontiac. I reveled in riding down the road with my windows up and the air conditioning blasting out cool air. That thrill alone was worth the car payments. I remember driving with my brother and pointing out all the cars with their windows down, the poor souls without air conditioning. Of course, I had my comeuppance soon afterwards when the air conditioning broke down and I had to take the car to the dealer – with the windows down!

I am struck by how much we over-50s have come to depend on things like cell phones, ATMs and air conditioning that we lived without years ago. My mother, who is 85, hibernates most of the summer in her air conditioning. She never loved the heat, but now she’s terrorized by it. Air conditioning makes summer bearable for her. She also has a cell phone.

Being over 50 means that you have some context when (such as in a blackout) life hits you with a deprivation of some modern convenience. We may not like losing a modern convenience like a cell phone, but we can deal with it. We simply go back to 1970s mode and find a pay phone. But no matter what else happens, we just hope to God they don’t take away our air conditioning!

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