La Plus Ça Change...

...c'est le même chose...

On the drive into work today, I had a flashback... Back in the days of my callow youth, one of the biggest summer pastimes was hanging out at Hampton Beach on Friday and Saturday nights. We'd cruise around the strip a handful of times, looking at the scenery, then get out and walk the strip. Maybe stop for a burger or fried dough, maybe hit the arcade, or maybe just hang out by the car with the radio playin' some tunes watching the scenery scroll by.

Hey, when you're 17/18 years old and you live out in the 'burbs, it seems like the most natural thing in the world to do...

Well, the currency of the beach-cruiser is their car. Sometimes we'd go with a friend who had a really cool car, like a friend who had a lifted Toyota pickup and a killer stereo; other times it would be a quick spin around in my Buick and then park, knowing that my little Regal couldn't compete with the Mustangs, Camaros, and other fancy muscle and sports cars cruising the strip. It was a role I accepted begrudgingly, always hoping that someday I'd have a car worth cruising in, either a shiny new Corvette (never mind the wisdom of cruising the strip with a male friend in a two-seater sports car...) or a vintage muscle car (yes, even then I was a motorhead).

So it was with more than a little hint of envy and jealousy that I'd watch these spoiled prep kids drive by in their shiny new Mustang GTs or a Saab convertible or a BMW 3 series. I'd look at my used, dented, older car - never mind that it served me well and I owned it outright - and think about how much cooler it would be to have something nicer, something newer, something fancier and flashier. Like I said, I was 17/18 - critical thinking takes a back seat when the guy in front of you has three girls crowded around his Z28...

Well, when life hands you lemons, you just chuck 'em as hard as you can at the people that piss you off, right? We developed a pretty good repetoire of insults and put-downs for the blow-dried kids with the fancy cars.

"Hey, I hope you thanked your dad for buying you that car."

"Oh, look, it's 'Everyone gets a Mustang' Night here at Hampton!"

and my own personal favorite, spoken in a clear, loud, stage voice whenever some puke would drive by in a BMW convertible or other car that no teenager would ever own:

"Hey, tell your mom I like her car".

This one was almost always guaranteed to get a laugh out of the surrounding crowd, and was used sparingly - usually when the rich kid driving it started getting too much attention from the distaff gender. Most often it was met with a stony silence; often it was accompanied by a revving of the engine; I don't think I ever had anyone challenge it beyond "No, this is *my* car!" (which, naturally, was met with the aforementioned line about thanking daddy...).

This series of exchanges came to the forefront of my mind on the ride into work this morning. Sitting at a light waiting to go straight, I watched as the silver-haired gentleman in the VW Beetle convertible pulled up next to me, car gleaming, radio playing clearly at a slightly elevated volume. And it was all I could do to keep from exclaiming,

"Hey, tell your daughter I like her car."

Sometimes I'm a bad, bad man...

That is all.