Down Memory Lane

Marko I remember those DDT spray trucks too.

That sounds like an idyllic childhood yohannrjm .  We don't have communities like that anymore at least not around here.  

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I also remember all the time and effort we used to put into making mix tapes - you didn't just mash together anything.  Now with things like iTunes and genius nobody has to even think about mix tapes.  Too bad.

My childhood was pretty idyllic by today's standards, but it wasn't all sunshine and roses. Tight communities come with issues of their own. However, with all its flaws, I'll take my childhood over what my kids have to deal with now.

Mix tapes were a big part of growing up. I remember choosing the track listing carefully and then spending evenings over at my friends homes making copies onto Philips and Memorex tapes. It was also a bit of a thing during courtship in my community. I remember making a couple of tapes for various girls I was interested in.

That tradition carried on with me and I made a mix CD or two for my wife when we were dating. She still has them, though she's never warmed up to Tom Waits. She made one for me too, which I still listen to.

How could she not like Tom Waits?? Seriously though, a lot of time and thought went into those mix tapes. Some people were renowned for being masters of the mix tape. They probably went on to become DJs.

Its true that we tend to filter out the negative when reminiscing about the past - I can recall those hot summer days when a gang of us neighbourhood kids would run down the street in the cool mist of the DDT fog that the City used to spray on the trees. They just drove trucks up and down the streets fogging the trees, and us kids running behind too and anything else that got in the way with toxic pesticide . And they wonder why cancer rates are so high.

In Bombay, they had guys with a contraption strapped to their backs that sprayed the pesticides around. I'm not sure what the pesticide was, but it probably was DDT. We'd all run behind the 'fog man' as we called them, breathing in all that pesticide. It was pretty exciting. I think they stopped doing that before I hit my teenage years, but my memory is a little fuzzy on that. Like you, I wonder what price we'll pay for that.

When I was 16, I learned to drive in my grandfather's 1959 Buick Electra, just like in these images. It already was a few years old, but he kept it maintained well. Mobility! Independence! What a rush.

churchilllafemme what a beauty!! I had an after school job when I was 16 washing and polishing cars (they call it detailing now) at a used car lot called Classic Corner. They sold hot rods!! I was in heaven. I'm not sure I even got paid but what a blast. On weekends I got to drive some of them out to run errands. He had a nice 57 corvette, emerald green with mother of pearl panel, 58 corvette cherry red with white panels, it had a modified 327 4 speed (the 57 was a smaller block with a 3 speed) and I couldn't let out the clutch without squawking the tires no matter how carefully I did it. Sale price @5,500. I wished I had enough money to buy that. He had a nice cherry red / white rag top 62 Chev Impala 4 speed, dual quad, posi-traction 409, right, she's real fine , a baby blue 57 T-Bird - that darn leather bench seat with faux bucket seat backs was hilarious - you had to have a babe in the passenger seat all squeezed up close because if there was nobody in that seat when you made a left turn you just slid right over to the other side!! The seat was fairly hard, polished leather. He had a 69 El Camino, that sucker was wild, with a really light back end that liked to pass you if you were not careful on the throttle. I still follow the same washing, drying and polishing technique the boss/owner taught me.

Here's a car story:

When I was in Bombay, cars were expensive and only very rich people had them. Most of us rode motorcycles. So I never learned to drive; it simply wasn't necessary.

I came to the US for grad school and was in a city where the bus system was pretty good, so between the bus and a bicycle, I was all set. I married in grad school and my wife and I decided that to help with the kid and household stuff, I should learn how to drive. She taught me (stick) on her Ford Contour. We called it 'The Purple People Eater', as it was purple and had issues. We needed a second car because of our contrasting schedules at the time, and she knew a friend of a friend who had just bought a new car and had her old one sitting at her mom's. After some negotiation I was the proud owner of a 1995 Lincoln Towncar. It looked something like this:

[Image: 15543392.jpg]

It was (visually) in good shape, but we were told that:

A) The tyres needed to be replaced, and
B) The suspension didn't work

I was willing to get new tyres and didn't care much about the suspension, so I paid $1000 for it. We drove it directly to the tyre place and asked them to replace all 4. The suspension issues were not really pronounced. Then we went off to have lunch while they worked on it.

When we got back the mechanic said. "We're almost finished. Do you want me to turn on your suspension?". I said, "Yes, I know the suspension doesn't work. It's okay." He replied, "No, there's a switch in the trunk that turns it on. Let me show you." So he flips the switch and the car rises up.

As you can imagine, I was very, very happy about that. My wife and I were high-fiving each other for a few days after that. The car was in amazing shape and it had all the bells and whistles, but I never got to like the ride of air suspension, as I like to corner fast and that's not what it was made for. Still, it was a pretty decent first car.