A silver fox in an old MX5

It’s my third summer now with the MX5, and with all due respect to those pop psychologists, I didn’t buy it because I was menopausal, even though I’m probably of an age that’s ripe for it. I bought it because I wanted one when I was seventeen and couldn’t afford the insurance. By the time I could afford it, I was married with kids, so a two seater sports car was impractical and I ran around for a quarter century in a family hatchback instead. Then the kids reached a stage when they wouldn’t be seen dead going out with me any more and suddenly that open topped sports car was on the cards again, and if you go for an old second hand one, neither are they particularly expensive.

But there’s nothing the media likes more than to gather a few pop psychologists and poke fun at all us silver foxes pretending to be teenagers. I mean, can’t we see how ridiculous we look? I suspect such articles are written by people in their twenties, who have no idea what it actually feels like to be a man in their fifties. Well, you know what? Being a man in your fifties feels just like being a man in your twenties, except in one or two significant respects which makes being in your fifties infinitely better.

I took the MX5 to the Yorkshire Dales today, a round trip of about a hundred miles, drove it with the top down all the way, not in order to attract the admiring glances of women, but because there’s a greater sense of presence when you drive this way. The air feels good once you get off the highways and you appreciate the scenery more.

I took the car to the Dales because I wanted to climb Penyghent. It’s something I’ve been doing since I was in my twenties. I’d puff and wheeze my way up it back then, and I still puff and wheeze my way up it now. I’m not worried about advancing age, I’m not trying to prove anything, this is nothing about bucket-lists or raging at the setting of the sun. I took the car to the Dales, I did the hill, and I called for coffee on the way back. It was a great day out and I didn’t once feel self conscious or stupid.

The Mazda’s in the garage now cosseted under its dust sheet, and I’m in the summer house with a glass of wine and the laptop, thinking back over the day. There were plenty on the hill who were a good deal older than me, and they’re an inspiration in the sense that no one is too old for anything. Granted, I wouldn’t recommend climbing Penyghent in your eighties if you’ve never done a day’s walking before, but if you’ve been doing it all your life nothing’s going to stop you, is it?

I’m not saying the male menopause doesn’t exist, because it does, and a man must deal with it as best he can. But what the writers of pop articles about the male menopause overlook is that it’s no fun being young either. Being young has its own problems. True, you’ve more chance of attracting beautiful women and making love to them when you’re younger, but I seem to recall there was a downside to all of that as well, and one I definitely don’t miss.

On my way up to the Dales, I stopped at some lights and a brand new Maserati pulled up beside me. It was growling like a tiger with bad guts. The driver wasn’t a silver fox, just a rich bastard with more money and ego than he knew what to do with. I could tell what was coming. When the lights changed that Maserati set off like a bat out of hell, the driver’s point being that his willy was bigger than mine. By the time I’d even snicked her into second, he was just a dot in the distance. His car was worth about £60K, mine about £900, not much of a contest, yet he still felt the need to establish his simian “superiority”.

It doesn’t take much of a psychologist to work out he’s got a considerable menopause waiting for him.

My MX5 is fourteen years old now, done 80K, still drives like new. The 1.6 litre engine isn’t particularly quick, but she’s gutsy on the hills. We attract a lot of bumper stick on BMWs and Mercs and Audis because they’re more powerful and go faster, and their drivers are rude and impatient and not a bit dim. She’s generally in good nick. Her back wings have had some work in the past, but they’re starting to bubble though again and she’ll need a bit of tidying up soon. Returning to her this afternoon after a couple of hours on the fells, I was glad to see her, glad to pull off my boots and settle into her, and I was looking forward to dropping the top and enjoying the sunshine on the drive home. In short she adds something to the day that those old family hatchbacks did not. It’s significant, I think, that I remember none of them with affection.

The menopause in males isn’t about hormonal changes, it’s about the dying of the light, the fear of death and the realisation of its proximity at time when we feel we’ve not yet begun to live, when we haven’t yet made a difference in the world. The ego cannot accept its impending annihilation and seeks as a last gasp some way of making its mark even if that risks killing us or making us look stupid. And the bigger the ego, the bigger the problem. There’s nothing surprising about this, no complex psychology, no thesis to be written. The risk is we’ll rage against it, or we’ll pretend we’re still in our twenties, that even as our hair greys, the sun will never set. Neither attitude is helpful, and neither are smart-arse psycho pop articles that miss the point entirely.

So if you’re a silver fox like me who missed out on that old MG when you were younger, don’t let societal jokes or pop psychologists get under your skin. Sure, you’re not in your twenties any more, but neither are you dead. If your kids have flown the nest and you can persuade the wife she’ll enjoy it, then go for it my friend. Stop thinking about how others see you; don’t live your life through their eyes. You are the eyes of the world as you see it, and it’s your purpose in life to go out and enjoy life as best you can, and if that means being a silver fox in an old MX5, then so be it.

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A Racy Lady who turns heads

Mazda MX5 Mk2 – 02 Plate

It’s now a week since I picked up the Mazda. The day before I was worried I’d made a terrible mistake, buying such an old car after no more than a quick look round and a ten minute test drive. What if I’d missed something? Rotten door bottoms, bubbling wings, blue smoke, badly fitting rag-top, leaking oil, duff tyres. The list of things that can go wrong with an older car is long indeed, especially if it’s not been pre-loved, and the dealer turns out to be a rogue.

The car was waiting when I rolled up. The top was down and the guy had washed it off for me. To my immense relief it looked even better than I remembered. A quick card transaction, a handing over of documents, and I was on my way. In real terms it’s probably the cheapest car I’ve ever bought, but easily the one that has impressed me the most.

The drive home was a real pleasure; a hot, sunny afternoon, and the way taking me along the winding country lanes of the West Lancashire coast. The car warmed quickly and ran sweetly.

It has been loved, I think, and the wad of service reports reassures me it’s also been well maintained. I did no more than forty, but it felt like I was flying. I made a quick stop for petrol and the lad in the shop complimented me on the car. It’s a conversation starter, something that’s not happened in 35 years, not since the days of my ancient Mk1 Cortina Super. The Cortina was rotten underneath, but managed good show up top and conversations were frequent when I was out on my travels. Sure, it’s a long time since heads were turned by anything I’ve driven. The Cortina eventually collapsed, literally, its McPherson struts held in place by nothing more than spiders webs.

A long time ago. God bless it!

But now I’m cruising through West Lancs with the top down and girls are looking. Yes, girls! I assured number one son, who accompanied me, they were looking at him, not me. He assured me they were looking at the car, and not at either of us. We are both blessed, it seems with the same lack of self confidence.

I bought polish and spent the evening buffing her up to a deep blue lustre.

Oh, she’s lovely. Very lovely indeed!

I must have done a hundred miles since then, just driving around on short hops, getting a feel for her, identifying any problems areas. She’s not perfect. All but one of the tyres was duff, so I had to get a fresh set right away, and the brake pads will be next. The driver’s side hood clamp doesn’t latch – a common problem on MX 5’s – but hardly a reason for gnashing one’s teeth, and is easily fixed. There’s also a tendency to bounce when taking up drive in first and reverse gears when she’s cold – another common idiosyncrasy of certain Mk 2.5’s, I’m told, but this one’s more a question of how you handle her than spending a fortune on unnecessary  repair. I’m sure there’ll be other things that surface as our acquaintanceship deepens, but my main worry, the bodywork, is fine. This is a 12 year old car, but it’s in better shape than my 7 year old Astra whose door bottoms, to my dismay, are already starting to bubble through.

The attention the car drew on that journey home has continued. A small two seater sport’s car cruises by and people look at it. I do  it all the time, thinking: isn’t that lovely? And I must get one of those before I’m too old to enjoy it! So I don’t mind that others do it to me, but there’s another kind of attention that’s been much less welcome. It’s a kind of maleness I’m uncomfortable with, and it smells of over-ripe testosterone.

My longtime companion, that grey old Astra with his rotten door bottoms, does not inflame egos. We’ve done Seventy thousand miles together over the years, without so much as a second glance and that’s the way we like it. I’m not a sporty driver. I don’t take corners on two wheels. I like the feel of speed on the straight, but I don’t push my luck. But with the Mazda I’ve had cars overtaking me for the fun of it, running dangerously and blind on the wrong side of the road into bends. I’ve had other soft-top saloons suddenly come alive and pull wheel screeching burnouts in a village where the speed limit is a very sedate 20 MPH.

Oh, how I like the feel of this car! I like the sound of it, and I can’t stop driving it, but after a week, I’m growing tired of looking in the rear view mirror to see a fluorescent Ford Focus with go faster stripes and an adolescent-brained driver behind the wheel, sitting on my bumper, weaving about aggressively.

There have been three recent road deaths in my locale, all caused by stupidity and carelessness involving cars – the victims were all pedestrians or cyclists. Makeshift memorials pepper the black-spots, reminders as stern as the GATSO cams, that motoring without due care and attention is dangerous – says me with three points and an SP30 on his license.

I don’t know what kind of life my Mazda has known in the past, but it looks like she’ll be getting a lot of sand kicked in her face with me behind the wheel. If you’re out and about and you should cruise up behind a little blue Mazda with a silver haired driver behind the wheel, tootling along at forty, and you fancy a bit of sport, don’t bother, because he’s not up for it. Back off or pass me safely because the closer you get, the slower I’ll go. Let me enjoy my old Mazda in ways that does not involve you, or endanger other users of the road.

She and I are strictly Zen these days.

She?

Actually, I’m puzzled by that gender thing. The Astra is male, a safe, steady commute-mobile, slab sided and grey – old Grumpy. But the Mazda’s curves definitely suggest something female. A name hasn’t struck me, but I’m sure it will in time. The good lady Graeme fingers the frayed creases of the ragtop and suggests “Leaky”, but we’ve not been out in the rain yet, so we don’t know about that one for sure.

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Thirty five years of sensible

Menopausal – that was the word used when I declared my sudden interest in buying an old racing car. I’m fifty three and perfectly aware of the cliché, and you don’t need to tell me about the menopause; it’s a danger to be negotiated by all men, yet a thing women seem terribly confused about; they accuse us of it one minute and tell us it’s a myth the next, but it’s not a myth, and I know because I’ve already been through it. I’m strictly post menopausal these days, honestly.

Unlike women, for whom the menopause brings physical change, for men it’s psychological. It’s about the realisation of one’s mortality, advancing years, and the possible futility of existence. Men react differently, some externally by doing things like buying racing cars, conquering Everest and running ten miles a day. Others react internally by exploring meditative traditions and pondering over Zen aphorisms. The former is to go down fighting, it is the warrior’s way, and there’s much to be admired in it. The latter is more the way of the monk; it is to enjoy the sun while it’s shining instead of shaking one’s fist at it while it sets. I think I fall into the latter camp, so why this sudden buzz about a racing car?

Well, it’s not a recent thing; it’s been in my system for thirty five years. In my novel “Langholm Avenue” the protagonist drives an old MG Midget through the wreckage of his past, the car being like the one he bought as a teenager, and couldn’t afford to insure. There’s a lot of me in that novel. I’ve been saying I’d have another, “one day”, but MG Midgets are looking old and small now, and I’m sorry to say they were never very good. They ran well when they were running, but they broke down a lot, because British cars of that period had little to recommend them besides a certain misplaced patriotism. Then we pulled out of massed two seater sports-car production completely and handed the market to the Japanese, and I’m glad we did because the Japanese had a think about it, and gave us the Mazda MX5.

I like the look of these cars. I like the way they feel. They are not ordinary – not supercars by any means, but cars designed to feel like those old MG’s and Triumphs once did. They are also cars that most of us can aspire to and, unlike those old MG’s and Triumphs, they are not plagued by niggling manufacturing flaws, and they have engines that are difficult to burst.

Modern cars have become appliances – no longer to be enjoyed for what they are. They are conveniences, only really noticed when they go wrong. But with a racing car you feel every bit of gravel along the way, and when you rev them the car flexes and twitches like it’s an alive thing. The ride is noisy, throaty, thirty feels like fifty, and with the top down they’re cold, but they are exciting, and as impractical as they are beautiful.

Now, if I’d wanted such a car in order to simply look good in it, that would obviously have been a mistake. But age, like male pattern baldness, has a way of dissolving vanity and egotism. Rule number one: a middle aged man with a wife and kids does not buy a sexy car in order to pull birds and make other guys jealous. But this does not mean he has to stop enjoying cars – or so my sons have been reminding me – reminding me too of my earlier brush with racing cars, and my oft spouted hankering for the throaty roar and a leaky rag top, plus: “If you leave it much longer Dad, you’ll be too old to get in one.”

It all sounded very plausible, very tempting, but I’ve been reluctant, as if denying myself for no good reason, perhaps afraid of it going wrong, of picking up a lemon like that old MG, thirty five years ago. Sure, since then I’ve learned my lesson, learned to be sensible, and safe. Motoring is no longer a thing to be enjoyed, I retort, sarcastically, but merely endured.

Undeterred, number two son found me some nice MX 5’s on Autotrader. This ignited something queer in me – I don’t know what, exactly, but it felt good – and after a weekend spent like a re-born petrol-head inspecting tyres and leaky rag-tops and various dings and scratches, I found myself on Sunday morning drawn to a deep blue 1.6 litre Mk 2.5 with 75K on the clock. The man handed me the keys and, along with number one son, I took her out for a run. My approach was cautious – the old head, dented by past experience and still looking for the snag, while my sons advice, gloriously untarnished, was the impulsive shrug and the urge to just do it.

But how could I? It was ridiculous.

After half a mile, I turned the thing around and we rattled back to the man. I didn’t need to think about it any more. I’ve never driven a car that made me feel the way this one did. After thirty five years of being sensible it was indeed time to just do it. So, I shook the man’s hand and I pick her up in a couple of days. Expect petrol-headed posts for a while on the rekindled joys of motoring – or on the foolishness of a menopausal monk and his struggles to offload a lemon with a leaky rag-top.

Graeme out.

 

 

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