Old cars, parking lots, and values

I told a story to the family today at dinner and none of them had heard it before.  That is so rare I decided to blog it.

 

 

 

So Meme and Grandpa have always lived below their means.  They just were never into material things.  When I was a teenager, Grandpa was still driving the same Volkswagen Beetle (“Bug”) that he had when they got married back in 1969.  That thing was so old, the hot Alabama sun had peeled the dark blue paint right off the top of the car.  Grandpa, being a physicist, decided to repaint his roof white so the Sun wouldn’t damage the paint.  So, he drove around in those days in this old, dark blue VW Bug with a big blotch of white paint right on the top.  It looked like a giant bird had just pooped on the car.

 

Now the other thing you must know about Grandpa to understand this story is that he hated to look for parking spaces.  He judged people if they spent time hunting for a ‘good’ spot.  If he calculated they spent more time hunting for a spot than it would take them to walk across the parking lot from an obviously empty section at the far end of the parking lot, he figured there was something mentally wrong with them.  He also taught me to take my foot off the gas as soon as you could see the next light was red.  Why waste gas if you were just going to come to a stop anyway?  But I digress.

 

So, in the early 80’s, Grandpa was working as an engineer at Brown Engineering. I think he was working on the optics for spy satellites as part of Reagan “Star Wars” program or something – it was classified.  He wasn’t happy with the program in general but he was well qualified for the specialist work the company needed.  Now, the only other folks at work that parked at the far side of the parking lot were those with super fancy cars.  They didn’t want to chance anyone opening a door into their car and putting a dent into it.  So, on the far side of the lot there were Lamborghini’s, new BMW’s, and Grandpa’s ancient VW Bug with a giant bird poop on the top.  

 

Although Grandpa never said it, I imagine the secretary in the front office kinda flirted with the handsome Allan Rideout.  What I do know is that he told me she would tease him about driving such a run-down car.  Rather than explain all his values and lack of need to participate in the conspicuous consumption culture, he would just joke around about needing a raise.

 

Now, this secretary probably had no idea of what Grandpa’s job entailed – he’s a very down-to-Earth guy and she probably had no clue how specialized his skill set was.  So she would tease him and they would joke around about his needing a raise.  She probably earned minimum wage herself.  Back in those days, folks got paid with a physical check every two weeks which you picked up on your way home at the front secretary’s desk. 

 

Since she felt they had a good relationship and they were always joking around about his needed a raise, one time she peeked at his check as she handed it to him (“let’s see if they finally got you that raise…”).  When she saw how much he was making, she was just struck speechless.  In her world it would make no sense for someone making that engineering money to drive around an old beat up car.  It just didn’t make any sense.  Nothing made sense to her anymore.  I imagine her mind imploding as Grandpa laughed while grabbing the check out of her hand and hiking all the way across the lot to his VW Bug amidst the BMW’s and Lamborghini’s…