Over the Christmas period my wife and I binged watching all ten episodes of The Crown. We also have a weakness for the likes of Morse and Foyles War. But I’ve realised that whilst my wife loves these programmes for the plot lines, I don’t really care about the stories. I just drool over the cars!
They are what I call proper cars with wonderful sweeping lines, long bonnets, running boards and big headlights. I even love the way the front doors open the wrong way.
It’s pure nostalgia of course, taking me back to the way cars were in the 1940’s and 50’s. The other day I was brought up short at the sight of a Morris Minor – exactly same model my aunt used to let me drive around Oxfordshire when I was 17. I gazed inside at the steering wheel and the dashboard. The memories flooded in rather like a police reconstruction designed to jog peoples’ memories.
I even used to own some of the models I see on the tellie. My first car was an Austin 7 made in 1936 but I soon progressed to a Rover 12 and then to P4 saloons. (Fancy referring to a car as a saloon; sums it up perfectly.) After my Rovers came Bentleys! A gorgeous black R Type that broke my heart when the engine blew up on the M1 near Sheffield. I replaced it with an S2, an enormous car that swished along on huge wheels, expensively but effortlessly, cocooning me from the outside world.
All this was before I knew about global warming and carbon footprints. Does that sound like a feeble excuse?
Never mind, nowadays I drive a supposedly environmentally friendly Toyota Prius. Something of a comedown but better for my conscience!
