It promised to be one of those perfect summer days. Not too hot and not too humid...just right for a Sunday ride through the twisty, winding back roads of the country. It promised to be a great day of personal solitude and reflection.
As I saddle my favorite two-wheel “steed”, the motor barks to life with a press of the starter button. The screaming whine of this gentle beast is a far cry from my first sense of freedom, a ’57 HD panhead. There are some things in everyone’s life that they never forget and one of them is their first set of wheels. For me that was over 40 years ago and my fascination with anything mechanical is still a huge part of my life. There are some things that never get old, like a fast car or bike. As they say, it’s not the destination that’s important, it’s the journey. For the next several hours, my world will follow the undulating rhythm and flow of asphalt and speed. As long as I can do this, I will never grow old.
The day has been just as I expected with no disappointments. When it comes time to rest and stretch my legs, it is always a pleasure to find that little spot that time has forgotten. Those little places where all the locals meet and where a stranger is as obvious as an alien from outer space. It’s the kind of place where you relax and wonder, “could I live in a little place like this?”. Although it seems like another world, it still has its history and in some ways it is more connected than the world I just came from. It’s time to relax under a shade tree and contemplate my future and journey home.
It always seems inevitable at a place like this that there is the preverbal abandoned vehicle or two or three...each one rusting and deteriorating into the surrounding foliage with no place to go. Because my career involves the sale and delivery of these artifacts at the beginning of their life, it is always strange to see them in this condition. It’s like seeing an old military veteran at the 4th of July parade. We’re seeing someone who is finishing their “life-cycle”. We have no connection to the life they have lived. We have no connection to the people they have touched. We have no connection to their joys and hardships. Like that old veteran, these vehicles have a history and I’m often reminded that there was a time their life was just beginning.
As I investigate the metal carnage, I spy a very old GMC pickup of indeterminate age. It’s the kind of truck that someone would pay a small fortune for at a Barrette-Jackson auction, but there is a huge gap between that one and this specimen. It is questionable if you could even get scrap metal value for this old truck. But yet, does this truck have any less “value” than the one that will be pampered and preserved for years to come. Personally, I’m not so sure.
Just like the old veteran, this old truck had a birth. There was a day when it rolled down a big industrial city assembly line, probably Detroit, and was as pristine and fresh as a new-born baby. It had that new-born smell we all cherish when we buy a new vehicle. Its skin was all shiny and unblemished. Its whole life was ahead of it and it would soon be in someone’s trusting care. I guess that is why we say a customer “takes delivery” of a new vehicle. That connection will immediately create a bond. I think about this old GMC and I start to wonder. Did it begin its life in New York,
Los Angeles, New Orleans, Miami, Little Rock, Omaha, or maybe Texarkana? Was its first owner a farmer, landscaper, carpenter, plumber, surfer or maybe a doctor, lawyer or Indian Chief? Was that person young, old, male or female? Whoever they were, they were probably only the first of many owners this truck would have over the years to come.
As is usually the case with things that wear out and go through a change of ownership, it probably meant something different for each new owner. How did this GMC serve its owners over those years? What memories where created in that truck. Was there someone conceived in that truck? Was there someone born in that truck? Did someone die in that truck? Did someone drive it across country? Did someone take it to college? Did someone drag race it on Saturday nights? The possibilities are as endless as our imagination. One thing I think for sure is that its past was not as mundane as its present appearance.
This old GMC surely must have had an eventful life. That’s the way it is with trucks. They are more than transportation. Pickups are “companions”. If I had been able to do a genealogy search on this old GMC, I’m sure there would be stories to tell. If only “Ole Blue” could talk. Like the old soldier, what is the true “value” of a lifetime of service? Some people will never see anything beyond what is there before their eyes. “Ole Blue” will never speak to them. If only they could hear “Ole Blue” talk…
Bernard Sisman
Fleet & Commercial Manager
Cincinnati, Ohio
