For The Love Of Choppers … & Vettes

When I was just a little kid, I fell in love with motorcycles. I get that from my Dad. He is a Harley man true-to-the-bone. He has always loved these wonderful machines & always had motorcycle magazines lying around the house. He would show me pictures of different cycles & tell me all about this chrome & that engine & I was always wide-eyed in amazement. Some of them were just so beautiful with their hand-painted tanks & shiny handlebars. And I especially loved the Choppers.

How could you not love a Chopper? They have this wild & free mystique that always perks up visions of “Easy Rider”, which I of course saw when I was just that little girl in ponytails.

If you have never felt the pulse between your legs or heard that low throaty growl of the engine then you are missing such a breathtaking experience. I have not ridden in years but my Dad still has his Harley; although now it’s a cool looking maroon trike with all the sweet features.

Yet I see very few Choppers on the road anymore. Its all Harleys & crotch rockets & rice burners. You have to go to a bike rally or bike show to see them, all gussied up as the belle of the ball, but not on the road. But they are still my favorite, even though my Dad says they don’t make for a smooth ride.

It wasn’t long after discovering cycles that I took a shine to cars. My Dad used to go to the drag races (without me) but would bring back some pictures of souped up engines & brightly colored bodies. And then of course he had all those hot rod magazines. He even had a mustang when I was a tot but I somehow thought it needed a stripe & took a rock & made that stripe myself … all around the car. Oops …..

I was probably all of about 10 years old when I fell in love with Corvettes. Talk about a cool car, they were IT. I loved the Stingrays & Sharks. Me, being the little photographer since I was 4, had my little camera with me at all times & would snap shots of Vettes anywhere that I saw them: in parking lots, in front of houses, wherever. Drove my Grandmother crazy, always having to stop for me to take pictures of a car. It didn’t matter to me what color they were or what condition they were in. They were still Vettes.


This is one of the photos I took of a Vette I spotted one afternoon in 1978 (as the photo is stamped on the back). It still gives me the giggles, this Vette just sitting there in all its coolness.

I found a few more photos of different Vettes I had taken but alas many have gone the way of the “who knows where they are” now. Wish I still had them. It’d be fun to see them again.

So do I still like Vettes? Yes & no. I like the old ones, like the Stingrays & Sharks. They still seem unbearably cool, like that Bandit gas-guzzler Trans Am, but I tend to really favor even older cars now: a 1930’s Packard, 57 Chevys, a 60’s Bentley. I still try to catch local car shows & snap hundreds of pictures of fins & steering columns & pink dice hanging from rear view mirrors.

Sitting here thinking about these Vettes seems to evoke an aura of nostalgia; of a time that was once very glorious & special. My own memories drifting back to lazy 70’s days spent listening to Fleetwood Mac & KISS, wearing handmade clothes, eating food that wasn’t full of preservatives & sitting with my Dad picking out Choppers in a magazine.

See Ya Again Soon,
BLUR

Music Playing = “Hotel California”